Aftermath: Part I
by thehammerofthor
Summary: This story bridges the gap between Winter and Spring. Joel witnesses the change that takes place in Ellie after the toll the Winter season takes on her, and does his best to help her deal with it while they press on towards Salt Lake City. The pair encounter obstacles, Infected, hunters, and plenty new experiences along the way. Concludes at the beginning of Spring in the game.
1. Chapter 1 - Aftermath

**A/N: First time ever writing Fan Fiction, so go easy on me. The characters and story of The Last of Us have stuck with me since finishing the game, and I thought I would let my imagination run wild and write some stuff down. For those who haven't played it yet, there are some mild spoilers below. This takes place just after what I found to be one of the most emotional scenes in the game: (SPOILERS) immediately after Joel pulls Ellie off of killing David. There's a line of dialogue we can't hear that Joel says to Ellie. This line is where the story picks up. I don't know how much more I'll write in the future, but it felt good to get this on paper. Hope you enjoy.**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 1**

**AFTERMATH**

"I'm gonna try to get you out of here, okay?"

She read the words off of his lips. Her head was swimming, and the rest of the world seemed to fade away. The smoke that was stinging her lungs seemed an afterthought, and the heat from the tears that ran down her cheeks and onto Joel's rough hands gave way to a strange numbness. Everything surrounding Joel's face in her vision grew dim and she locked her gaze on his eyes. Eyes that she had seen empty more often than not. Empty or cold; emotionless. Eyes that were now filling with pain and empathy. Eyes that she could swear were starting to well up with tears, as unbelievable as that thought was. She kept her eyes on his and nodded in acknowledgement.

Joel lowered his hands from cradling her face and helped her onto her feet. Keeping a hand on her arm, he wrapped the other around her and guided her to the front door of the restaurant. Looking ahead, Ellie saw where the frame had splintered under the weight of Joel's desperation. She wrapped her arm around his waist and pulled herself closer. His presence was an anchor to her, and she tethered herself to it. Amidst the terror and adrenaline within her, he became the eye of the storm, a calming wave that began to wash over her. The tears continued to fall, but at least her frantic breathing was returning to something resembling normalcy.

Joel leaned forward to check the surroundings before venturing outside. Deeming it clear, he led Ellie forward, away from the ravaged countenance of the monster who had tried to kill, or worse, his little girl. _My little girl_. The thought stopped Joel in his tracks temporarily.

Ellie clung to his side, trembling like a leaf, head still spinning, her whole being starting to go numb from shock, despite Joel's presence. Joel's eyes searched the glistening snow on the ground before them, looking for an answer to a question he didn't know he was asking. _My little girl_. He felt a tug on his right side as Ellie started to slip into unconsciousness.

He swept down and scooped Ellie off of her feet before she hit the ground. A grimace flashed over his face as a dagger of pain shot from his stomach. The wound. In his desperate search to find Ellie, the adrenaline had numbed the searing pain of his puncture wound. Nature's painkiller was starting to wear off. Gritting his teeth, he stood, Ellie's slight frame cradled limply in his arms. He readjusted her positioning to bring her head to rest against his shoulder.

"Ellie?" No answer. "Ellie?!" Nothing but the biting wind. He knelt in the snow and gave her the once-over. There was a deep cut on the bridge of her nose, spatters of blood smeared by tears on her freckled cheeks, and bruises beginning to darken the battered regions of her chin and forehead. Her hands were stained red and sticky with the blood of that cannibalistic son of a bitch. But she was still breathing.

"We've gotta get you somewhere safe," Joel said as he scanned the buildings of the lakeside resort. "Somewhere not here." He fought to stand against the pain emanating from his midsection, pulled Ellie's slight frame against his chest, and began trudging toward the house where they had stayed; the only landmark he had.

* * *

Joel carried her carefully down the stairs to the basement, continuously checking his footing while taking care not to bump her head on the cold cement walls. Everything was as he had left it since going to search for Ellie, and he gingerly lowered her unconscious body onto the mattress.

"We need to get you cleaned up," he said softly, more to steady himself than to comfort her. He rummaged through his pack for his canteen and the cleanest cloth he could find. He wet the cloth and began cleaning David's blood off of her hands. They were so small and frail against his weathered palms. Her little hands that had done things no one should have to do, least of all a 14-year-old girl. One hand clean, he began on the next, trying to wash away any evidence of what she had been through. He ran the cloth between each finger until claret gave way to the color of flesh.

As he worked, he felt a tear that had escaped from his left eye rolling down his cheek. _Poor baby girl_, he thought to himself, wiping his face with his sleeve. Her hands free of blood, he cleaned the cloth as well as he could and began to work on her face. Cold water dripped down her cheek from where Joel was dabbing the cut on her nose, causing her to stir. Her eyes slowly fluttered open, and she recoiled from Joel's touch, more from the human contact than the pain. He saw the fear that leapt from her eyes as she frantically scanned the room.

"Ellie, it's me... it's me... you're safe..." Joel said, attempting to soothe her.

When she realized where she was and who was by her side, she exhaled and laid her head back down.

"Joel..." she whimpered, squeezing her eyes shut through tears.

"I'm here, it's alright... lemme finish cleanin' you up and then you can get some rest."

She lie motionless, aside from a few involuntary sobs, while Joel gently finished tending and dressing her wounds. She hadn't known this side of him. She had most often seen him rough, ruthless, cold and calculating. She had even seen him rendered weak and helpless by his wound. She had never seen him gentle and paternal, and hadn't been sure what 20 years removed from his daughter would do to this side of him.

Her whole body ached. Her back from the table that... animal... had slammed her into, her ribs from the sharp kicks of his boots, her throat from his vice-like grip. The mere thought of him made her stomach turn. She shuddered, and Joel's eyes met hers.

"How're you holdin' up?"

She fought to keep the tears at bay. "I'm fine," she lied. The tears betrayed her.

Joel exhaled deeply as he straightened up, packing up the makeshift medical supplies. He sat down next to her and reached a hand up to wipe a tear off her cheek. Without thinking she reached up and put her hand on his.

"We'll get through this. I promise," he told her softly. She appreciated his economy of words. It suited him. "Get some rest, okay? If you need anything I'll be right here."

The light was fading from the window as evening came. He laid the same blanket that had kept him warm through all those cold nights over her tiny figure and then stretched out on the floor next to the mattress. Pulling his pack under his head, he turned to his side to face her. Ellie was in too much pain from the struggle to lie in any position but on her back, eyes closed from equal parts exhaustion and agony. She slid her arm up from her side to his direction, searching for him, a tension crossing her face.

"Joel?"

"I'm here," he said, taking her hand.

The tension eased. Barely audible, she said, "Thank you."

Joel smiled, eyes fixed on her. "You did this for me once."

He watched her protectively while her breathing became deep and slow. Her hand was still enveloped in his, and she would stir anytime he attempted to pull away, so he left it. Whatever it took for her to be at peace. Thoughts started creeping their way into his brain, ensuring that the sleep he already knew he wouldn't get that night would never come.

_My little girl._

He had forgotten what it felt like. What it felt like to truly care for someone. This waifish little spark plug of a girl that had made her way into his life by blind luck had opened his eyes to the concept of being human again. A concept he had long thought impossible in the hell this world had become.

He studied her face and watched her breathe, making sure every inhale and exhale went off without a hitch. _Just give her one night of peace. One night of peace before the nightmares inevitably come_, he thought to anyone listening.

He rubbed her fingers between his and whispered "'night, baby girl."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 2**


	2. Chapter 2 - Nightmare

**A/N: Thanks for the positive feedback on the first chapter! I'm excited that people seem to be enjoying it. I don't really know how I'm going to continue bridging the gap between Winter and Spring, but below is the next chapter in the story. It picks up where Chapter 1 left off. It gets a bit dark at the end, fair warning. Hope you enjoy reading this!**

******DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 2**

**NIGHTMARE**

Joel studied the cracks in the cement floor through weary eyes. Beams of morning's light fell from the window to each fracture, accentuating their depth. Callused fingers traced their branching paths, eyes lagging behind the listless movements.

Sleep had never come, but he expected as much. His mind was wrought with deliberation. What on earth was he to do? How can he hope to heal the mental and emotional wounds of this poor little girl when he never managed to mend his own? He picked fruitlessly at the cracks, hoping he'd find an answer hidden between the jagged slabs of cement.

He sat with his back against the wall, the mattress holding the sleeping girl before him. Ellie had slept soundly for nearly the entire night, occasionally stirring with furtive whispers of "no... no..." that Joel had managed to pacify with a reassuring word and gentle hand.

His hand moved to the coarse and itchy stitches that prickled under his shirt. He winced at the pain, but it was noticeably more bearable. He was healing, slowly. Joel brought his knees up to his chest and propped his elbows upon them, sighing deeply. He was doing his best, but this might be beyond his breadth. The most he'd ever had to comfort Sarah for was maybe a sprained ankle at a soccer game. Child's play compared to nearly being killed and eaten, maybe even raped for all he knew. God, the horror. Ellie was strong for her age, but no one goes through an ordeal like that and comes out unscathed.

Her groan pulled him out of his thoughts and back to her side.

"Ah... fuck..." she moaned, one hand to her forehead, the other gingerly touching her ribs.

"Lie back, you're probably going to be pretty sore for a few days," Joel opined.

Ellie obeyed and her head returned to the mattress. She began moving her hands to different regions of pain, taking stock of her wounds.

"Ah I feel like I got hit by a truck," she said through pained breaths, and turned her head to look at Joel. "What about you? Last I checked you were the one mortally wounded."

He was touched by her concern, and let out a surprised chuckle. He rubbed the stitching again. "I'll live. More concerned with how you're doin'."

"Physically? A day of rest and I should be fine," she said.

He studied her face. "And besides physically?"

Ellie's green eyes studied the ceiling, and she remained quiet for what was an unsettling amount of time, even to Joel.

"Ellie?"

Another long pause.

"Things happen, and we move on," she offered blankly.

Joel's brow furrowed, and he gave himself a mental kick for using those words. "Look, I... I know what I said about these kinds of things, but..." he paused, and decided, "...I think this is the kind of issue where talkin' about it might help... might do some good..."

The silence was deafening. Her eyes examined every board in the rafters. She opened her mouth to speak, but changed her mind after the word, "I..." After another minute, all she managed to say was, "I can't."

Joel's eyes dropped to his hands as they wrung each other. He tried. He didn't know whether he should pry or just let her be. He glanced up at Ellie and the tear moving from the corner of her eye to her auburn hair made the decision for him.

"Okay. That's fine," he said. "Just... know that if you come to a place where you want to talk about it, I'm here."

If he wasn't mistaken he caught the slightest hint of a smile in the corners of her mouth. "Thank you," she replied, turning her gaze from the ceiling to his face. "Oh man... you look like shit. Did you sleep?"

"Had more important things to do than sleep." Ellie didn't realize what he meant, and started struggling to lift herself onto her elbows. "Where you think you're goin'?"

She turned to him in surprise, "You need to sleep, and sleep is best had on a mattress that smells of mold and mildew."

"You need it more than I do. I've slept on floors worse than this hundreds of times in my life. I'll manage," he insisted, instructing her to lie back down.

"Suit yourself. Hey, protip: your backpack will work as an impromptu pillow. Expect a slight kink in your neck in the morning though."

Joel hated the idea of sleeping with Ellie in such a vulnerable condition, but he really did need the rest. Ellie was right, he was the one still healing from a serious wound, and needed all the rest he could get. His eyelids more closely resembled sandbags than anything else at that point anyway.

"All right. I reckon I'll try to get some rest." He reached into her pack and slid her 9mm over to her. "You hear anything upstairs, anything at all, even a mouse, you wake me up... got it?"

"Got it."

He fought to stay awake, but it was a losing battle. His eyelids slowly drew shut over the image of Ellie massaging her bruised ribs. In seconds he was out cold.

* * *

The nightmares were always the same. Sarah clung to him in his arms as he ran for their lives. He remembered the terror on her face, his instructions for her to look only at him. As they ran on the pathway toward the military checkpoint, it seemed to stretch on forever, the distance dilating every time he seemed to be nearing the end of it. The sounds of the recently Infected behind him continuously grew louder and more grotesque. All he could do was cling to his daughter and run.

Finally the military checkpoint was in reach. Gunfire flew past to mow down the herd of Infected hot on his heels. He remembered the words he said to her.

"We're safe."

He regretted the lie. He knew what was coming. Every time the dream came, he'd try something different. He'd shield her completely with his body, and bullets would pass harmlessly through him and tear into her. He'd run in a different direction to a different path but they always led to the military checkpoint. No matter what, the dream ended with his daughter dying in his arms.

The soldier trained his sights on Joel and his daughter. Joel pulled her in close and forced his eyes shut, knowing there was nothing he could do to stop what was coming. _My little girl_. A deafening crack was followed by a sickening thud as the bullet hit home. Distraught, he fell to his knees.

Something was different, yet... the same. He couldn't place what it was. He reluctantly opened his eyes. A shock of red hair. A scar on her right eyebrow. Lifeless, empty green eyes. A spreading circle of red deepening the red of her tropical T-shirt.

Joel woke up screaming.

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 3**


	3. Chapter 3 - Wounds

**A/N: I've been pretty overwhelmed by the positive reactions people have been having to this. I'm really enjoying writing them and I'm glad you all seem to enjoy reading them. I'm doing my best to try to stay true to these characters and imagine what this struggle must have been like. There are moments of brightness, but there are many of gloom. You can't have one without the other though. Light can't exist without darkness. Hope you all enjoy and forgive my typos, if any... I keep writing these at too late of an hour.**

******DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 3**

**WOUNDS**

A scream of terror became a scream of pain as Joel's hand flew to his side. Black spots materialized and evanesced in his peripheral vision as the exertion from the scream pulled at the stitching. He rolled to his hands and knees with gritted teeth and quelled the urge to cry out. With his mind's preoccupation on the pain, he didn't even hear Ellie's voice.

"Joel?! JOEL!?"

He hadn't even felt her hand on his shoulder. Steadying himself with even breaths, he lifted his head to the side and found a look of helplessness and concern on her face. She had dragged herself off the mattress and was alongside him.

Joel moved to a sitting position, with his back against the wall. His eyes met Ellie's, and the image of her lifeless body in his arms flashed into his mind, causing him to start.

"What is it?" she inquired.

Joel tried to vacate his mind, erasing the sickening nightmare, but it kept working its tendrils into his subconscious. He felt... guilty, as if he had betrayed Sarah somehow, and it left a hollow feeling in the pit of his stomach.

"I hate bad dreams," he said, running a hand over his face.

She smiled, remembering this conversation. "Yeah, me too." She moved to sit down next to him and pulled her knees up to her chest, gaze not leaving his face. "The dream again?"

He closed his eyes and drew a deep breath, leaning his head back against the wall. Finally exhaling, "Always is."

She noticed the pain behind his eyes when he opened them. Ellie had experienced more than one instance of Joel's nightmares, but something told her that there was more to the story this time. She brought her eyes to the floor and began wantonly tracing the same cracks Joel had been searching earlier.

"You woke up screaming my name. Scared the shit outta me."

Joel was slightly taken aback. He felt embarrassed, as if he had been caught red handed for a crime he couldn't help himself from committing. His eyes fell to the cracks as well, desperately searching for the words to say. "I uh- I'm sorry I scared you."

She turned away from the cracks and back to him. "You don't need to apologize," she said, inferring that he wasn't exactly eager to talk about the dream any further. Sighing, she leaned her head to rest on his shoulder. They sat this way for what seemed like hours.

Joel turned to look at her, "How long was I out?"

She glanced at the window. "The sun's rising, so... jeez, less than a day, but barely. I'd be lying if I said I was the vigilant lookout the whole night," she conceded.

He chuckled, "That's okay. We're alive."

Ellie pulled her knees closer and rested her chin upon them, regretting the decision upon landing on a bruise. She cringed but tried to hide it. He noticed what rough shape she was in. The cut on her nose had started to scab, and judging by the audible discomfort in her breathing he could tell her ribs were still tender. He could only imagine the severity of the bruises that covered them.

"How are you feeling today?" he asked her.

"Mmmm... better I think," she replied. Joel caught a hint of despondency in her voice. He wondered what he had missed all those cold bedridden days where Ellie went off on her own to provide for the both of them. He wondered what had gone down with the people in the town by the lakeshore. Judging by the way he found her swinging the machete with reckless abandon, it had to have been more than a little traumatizing. He couldn't imagine what she was going through, but something had definitely changed within her. Every sentence she spoke seemed to end on a somber note, as if her head was lost elsewhere else. Looking into her eyes, he noticed that somewhere inside the fire of her youth had gone dark, reduced to a smolder. Her innocence had been left to burn in that restaurant with the corpse of that sick bastard who robbed her of it. The realization broke his heart. He thought about the way that Ellie never really got to have a childhood, having been born six years after the world had gone to hell. She had been forced to grow up so fast and so young.

Joel's ruminations were interrupted by a loud growl from Ellie's stomach. "I guess we need to get some food in you... that thing sounds angry," Joel quipped, gesturing at her stomach. "Why don't we go see what we can find in the woods? I'm sure this place is crawling with rabbits, squirrels... heck, I bet there's no shortage of deer to hunt... whaddaya say?"

All of the color left Ellie's face as she receded into herself. Her eyes fixed themselves on something miles beyond the far wall of the room. The hunt rushed back into her mind. The hunt that marked the beginning of the nightmare that she lived.

Joel was unaware he had raked a fresh wound. "Ellie, I'm talkin' to you." She remained silent, still miles away. "Ellie!"

The miles turned into inches as her attention returned to Joel. "Huh? Oh... um... I think I'd rather stay here and rest," she responded shyly, avoiding eye contact.

Joel realized he had hit some sort of nerve, but in fear of touching it again by searching for it, he let it go. "All right, that's probably a good idea." He noticed the rabbit Ellie had shot a couple days earlier, still fresh in the frigid air of the basement. "I'm going to search for some food in the area to go with that rabbit we got there," he said, standing up.

Ellie hadn't moved from her position. "Don't be gone long," she said simply.

"I won't. I promise."

* * *

Joel was relieved to keep his word. He descended the stairs, box in tow, to find Ellie lowering her gun.

"Can't be too careful," she said curtly.

"No, you certainly can't. Good thinkin'," Joel said.

He showed Ellie the bounty he had collected: a few cans of food and a makeshift camping stove he had thrown together. Before he began preparing the food, he presented Ellie with the piece of bounty he was most proud of: an issue of Savage Starlight he was sure he hadn't seen in her collection yet. Her eyes sparkled briefly when they met the weathered cover, and the moment made Joel's search for it worth it.

Ellie found a comfortable position to lie on the mattress and page through the comic, studying each panel with eager eyes. Joel sat and worked on preparing their meal, but found himself spending more time watching her read than he did watching the rabbit cook. It was small moments like these that he savored. Moments where she'd read and tread the air, bouncing her legs off the mattress. Moments where she could be a kid.

They shared a meal of slightly burnt rabbit and canned beans that was nothing short of edible. Joel never prided himself on his cooking abilities, but they had kept them alive, and that's what mattered. He found himself missing Henry's culinary abilities. The guy managed to conjure up the most wonderful flavors with the most meager of seasonings.

Having tamed the beast that was Ellie's hunger, Joel retired to the floor, victorious and satiated. He lie on his back, examining the ceiling and contemplating their next move. "I reckon we need to keep pressin' on one of these days if we want to make Salt Lake City while the Fireflies are still occupants."

Ellie had put the comic away and was lying on her side, facing him. "Yeah. I suppose you're right," she replied. Her focus drifted again, momentarily. When it returned, she said, "After another night's rest, we can hit the road again."

"All right. I don't want to set off until you're ready to. Once you feel like you can take the trials the road will bring, we'll keep at it."

They settled in with a simmering apprehension for what the next day would bring. Joel drifted off on his side, facing Ellie, with a hand on the mattress. Ellie lie on her back staring at the ceiling. Her mind had been racing while Joel had drifted off, and she felt a loneliness creep in that always cut to her bones. Shivering, she rolled onto her side to face Joel. His presence always helped stave off those pangs of loneliness, and she was grateful for him. She reached over and took his hand in hers. Comforted, she began to drift off as well.

It was then that the inevitable nightmares finally arrived.

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 4**


	4. Chapter 4 - Demons

**A/N: Still overwhelmed by the feedback! It means a lot to read your kind words, really it does. This next chapter was more difficult for me to write. Having to illustrate what I imagined Ellie's worst nightmare to be like meant going to a pretty dark place. Oh, and to the guest reviewer who seemingly predicted what this chapter would be about, I'll have you know I've had it planned since before chapter 1. So na-na-boo-boo. I apologize for saying na-na-boo-boo. Anyways, I hope you all enjoy this next chapter!**

******DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 4**

**DEMONS**

Her head was driven into the dank carpet, causing stars to streak across her vision as a lash of pain spread from her forehead.

"You can try begging," he taunted. His voice had an otherworldly quality to it, a demonic undertone. Sulphuric breath singed her neck, licking at her ears.

"Fuck you," she spat.

He was impossibly strong, and she was completely pinned, helpless. This was hell. This was his domain. She felt herself being flipped onto her back. Long, blood-stained fingers became ropes around her neck.

"You think you know me, huh?" he seethed. She looked up into his inhuman eyes. They glowed crimson, burning with hatred. "Well let me tell you somethin'. You have no idea what I'm capable of."

The ropes tightened, coarse fibers biting into her flesh. She strained to breathe. The pain was unbearable. Her vision began to darken as she flailed around for something, anything to fight back with. Something solid struck her fingertips. A handle. She willed her fingers to grip the hilt of the machete and then swung forward with all of her remaining strength. The gleaming, gilded blade connected with the beast's forearm, conjuring a shriek that shook the foundations of the building. Black blood spurted from the open gash. Seeing an opportunity, Ellie leapt onto the demon. She lifted the blade high above her head and brought it down, putting her full weight behind the blow. It cleaved the monster's face in two with an eruption of black bile.

She was overcome with anger, frustration, frantic desperation, and fear. Her arms continued to swing the blade, her mind helpless to stop them. Again and again she brought the machete down on her captor. Tears were streaming down her face. Visions of the cage entered her mind. She struck again. An image of the animal affectionately touching her hand. _You're special_. She retracted the blade and brought it down again. She was on the butcher table, held in place. A meat cleaver hung in the air above her. She swung and buried the blade into the floorboards where a head used to be. It stuck, and she couldn't dislodge it.

Ellie stumbled backwards, terrified, clambering away from the ravaged corpse. Something wasn't right. Deadly silence saturated the empty restaurant. Black blood and bile was everywhere, and it began sucking the light out of the room. Only a small, dim circle of light remained encompassing her and the remains of the demon. She pulled her knees up to her chest and hugged them, trying to become as small as she felt.

She remained there for what felt like hours, too afraid to move. She couldn't tear her eyes away from the body. Her hands moved to cover her face, but she recoiled in horror upon seeing them dripping and black.

The body shifted in her peripherals and her eyes darted back to it. It couldn't have moved, yet something was different. She studied the corpse. Those weren't David's clothes. Hesitantly, she crept forward. Her eyes examined the body, unable to place the source of its familiarity. Then they fell on its left wrist, and dread consumed her: a broken watch.

Ellie awoke trembling in a cold sweat, only to find herself in an icy basement, utterly alone.

* * *

The crisp night air stung at his lungs. The clear, star-laden sky had turned what was meant to be a short trip to relieve himself into an extended moment of meditation. Joel leaned on the railing of porch, staring at the thousands of pinhole lights penetrating the black canvas of the heavens.

His mind wandered, but never straying far from a fixed point: Ellie. For the first time in years, he felt completely unequipped for a task. He could gather that something had broken within her. The harsh winter had forced her into a role that she shouldn't have had to assume. All of the burdens placed on her young shoulders had become too much for her to bear, and the incident with the cannibal was the anvil that flattened the camel.

Joel found himself longing to help her put herself back together, but had no idea how. It was more than a feeling of obligation, although obligation was certainly a part of how he felt. He had come to rely on Ellie. If it weren't for her, they would never have made it out of that university alive. If it weren't for her, Joel would be as cold as the slab of rebar-adorned concrete he had landed on. She had stitched him up, kept him alive, if only just. He didn't yet know how she had managed to get her hands on some penicillin, but she had saved him. She had stopped being "cargo" months ago. Now she was becoming something more.

He looked down to find himself running his thumb over the cracked face of his watch. He sighed, and felt a small wave of guilt wash over him again. He feared he was trying to replace Sarah, and his fear sparked a feeling of wariness towards Ellie. He was afraid of what the concept of replacing his daughter with some sort of surrogate said about him as a person, but he was more afraid of the concept of growing attached to someone. Losing Sarah had nearly killed him. If he came to care for Ellie in the same way in a world that doesn't offer the luxury of the knowledge that those you love will survive the day, could he survive losing another daughter?

Joel shook off the weight of the question and realized he had stood in the cold too long, toes starting to go numb. He turned and reentered the house. Trying to tread lightly as not to wake Ellie, he rounded the corner in the kitchen and headed downstairs. Midway down the staircase, he noticed the mattress was empty save for the disheveled blanket.

"Ellie?"

His eyes scanned four corners of the room, finally focusing on the form of a little girl curled up in the far corner, softly whimpering. She had her knees pulled up to her chest, her arms crossed on top of them, face buried in her sleeves. Joel knelt before her.

He reached an arm out cautiously, gently placing it on her arm. "Ellie? It's me." Her body shivered at the contact. She lifted her head from her sleeves, eyes overflowing with tears. Looking into her eyes, he found despair the likes of which he hadn't seen in twenty post-apocalyptic years. "What is it?"

She reached out and took hold of Joel's shirt, pulling her way into his arms and burying her face in the fabric. Deep sobs shook her tiny frame as Joel wrapped his arms around her, holding her. Every fiber of her being struggled to get closer to him, and the distance between them was never small enough for her satisfaction. He brought a hand up to cradle the back of her head as she nuzzled into his chest. She wept into him, and Joel let her.

"Nightmare?" Joel asked. He felt her nod against him.

"I..." she started, but was interrupted by another bout of sobs. After she had let them run their course, she managed, "I thought you had left me..." The sentence had barely left her lips when she broke down again.

"Oh, baby girl." Joel squeezed her tight. "That will never happen."

He tried to calm her down, but her weeping was unabated. His oath had only seemed to make her cry that much harder. Joel didn't know what to do. He knelt, cradling her, stroking her hair, doing everything in his power to soothe and reassure her, but whatever she had encountered in that nightmare had torn into a fresh wound. She was consumed by unmitigated anguish. Tears began to burn hot trails down Joel's cheeks as the feelings of helplessness and grief spread to him. It tormented him to see her like this. She had been so strong, feisty and brave beyond her years. To find her utterly broken in his arms cut him deep.

She wept and he held her, trying to be strong for her sake. Every time it seemed she might be calming down, something would trigger another round of sobbing. Not knowing what else to do, Joel remembered back to something Ellie had said as she helped him out of the university.

Clearing and unclenching his throat, he steadied himself and began to sing. Ellie sniffled and pressed her head to his chest, feeling the reverberations of every note. She didn't recognize the song, but the notes were deep, sonorous, and soulful. He sounded rusty, but he sang with such steady sincerity and she held onto every word. The song was the kind you sing to someone you genuinely love, and his singing brought a sense of peace to her heart. Having muzzled the weeping, she sat motionless in his arms, straining to hear every nuance of every line.

He came to the end of the song, repeating the line "We fight those demons, day in and day out..." Ellie shivered at how close to home the lyrics had hit. When he had finished the song, he was relieved to find that the despair had seemed to subside. Ellie's grip on him hadn't loosened, but she was quietly sniffling instead of wailing.

"You best get some rest," he said. He was right. She was exhausted from the whole affair, but couldn't force herself to let him go. "C'mon." He tried fruitlessly to peel her off. Eventually he was able to coax her fists into unclenching and set about to lay her back down to sleep.

She refused to sleep alone on the mattress and insisted that they share it. If it would keep the nightmares away, it was worth it. Joel lie on the edge of the mattress, wanting to give the battered and sore little girl enough room to move about, but a few seconds after his eyes closed, he felt Ellie sidle up next to him. He sighed, not daring to protest it. Before long, they had both drifted off.

The rest of the night was dreamless, as they kept one another's nightmares at bay.

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 5**


	5. Chapter 5 - Laramie

**A/N: Alright, slight change of pace with this chapter. I wanted to write something that wasn't quite as dreary, and while this chapter has it's moments, a great deal of it is trying to cater to the lighter side of The Last of Us (if it even has a "lighter side.") This one took awhile, but I had a lot of fun writing it and hope you enjoy the read. Thanks once again for all of your kind words, I enjoy reading the reviews! 'Til next time!**

******DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 5**

**LARAMIE**

Winter by itself made travel an arduous proposition. Recovering from injuries only served to make matters worse, and had turned what would, in good conditions, have been a couple days walk into burgeoning, nearly week-long trek. Ellie had concluded that at least one of her ribs was broken, and even after a week her breaths were still short and pained. The discolored bruises on her torso looked horrendous. They didn't have much of a choice but to push north towards the Colorado-Wyoming border, looking to join up with I-80, which Joel promised would lead them right into Salt Lake City. The neighborhood they had holed up in while recovering had been picked clean, and persistent hunger had forced them onto the road.

Joel wanted to avoid the capital city of Cheyenne, which might have been a shorter walk but was more likely to be home to hunters or larger hordes of Infected, and so they pushed on towards Laramie, following a two-lane highway denoted by the signposts as US-287. The snow covering the highway was fresh and deep. Several feet in places. Ellie had never seen so much of the stuff, and marveled at a grove of nearby trees, their boughs heavy-laden with snow. It was all rather beautiful, or would have been if winter hadn't become such an embodiment of despair to her. It was a season of death and sorrow, and even on bright, crisp clear days such as this she felt an overshadowing pall, an ever-present weight colluding with her cracked rib in an effort to suffocate her. She moved closer to Joel as they trudged along.

"Actually kinda pretty, ain't it?" he remarked, taking in their surroundings.

"Yeah," she replied numbly.

Joel was still trying to adjust to the increase of one-word answers to his attempts at conversation. Unless something interested her just right, she was unnaturally terse. Every response was a reminder that the chatty, inquisitive, joke book-wielding Ellie was gone, left behind at the Lakeside Resort. A pang of sadness hit him, and against his efforts, made its way to his face.

Ellie glanced over and noticed his dismay. She frowned as she continued dragging her legs through the snow, struggling to lift them with hunger-weakened muscles. Sadness sapped at her energy as well, and seeing how her behavior was affecting Joel only managed to compound the effect.

Her feet and her heart were blocks of ice, both in temperature and weight. She remembered the feeling of waking up in that basement alone. Her trudging slowed and eventually stopped. Joel had continued on for a few steps but, upon noticing her absence, turned back to find her standing in the snow, shivering, a hand covering her mouth. She shut her eyes and tears began to slide from her eyelids. His heart sank and he returned to her, taking her into his arms and tucking her head under his chin in a silent embrace.

He knew words were worthless at a time like this. He felt the shudders of her sobs as he held her, interrupted by short spasms of pain and quiet whimpers as the cracked rib cut her breaths short. After some time, she had regained her composure, and Joel pulled her away to look at her.

She wiped a tear from her cheek and sniffled, "Fuck. Sorry."

He put a hand under her chin and lifted her head. "No need," he smiled. Once again, she admired his laconicism, and found herself smiling as well. "C'mon, we still got a few miles before we hit Laramie."

* * *

The approach to any town is always nerve-wracking. One never knows what they'll find within the city limits. Infected, hunters, something worse?

Ellie spotted a signpost poking out of the snow at the side of the highway and galumphed her way over to it.

"Laramie. Population 30,816," she read. "I don't think I've seen thirty-thousand people over the span of my lifetime."

"Used to be one of the bigger towns in Wyoming back in its heyday. Imagine it's a ghost town now, though. C'mon, let's get into town. I'm lookin' forward to sleepin' indoors tonight."

"Holy shit..." Ellie relished the thought.

The nights had been harsh over the course of the week. They had managed to find a large sleeping bag back in the neighborhood where they had holed up, as well as a fairly damaged tent that did little more than block a bit of wind. Between the ragged tent, the sleeping bag, and using each other for warmth, they were freezing, but had staved off frostbite. Joel had faced harsh winters in the wilderness before, but Ellie's diminutive figure was ill-equipped to deal with the cold. He spent most nights holding her close, trying to transfer his heat to her trembling body. The nights were miserable, but they were alive.

A sign marking the junction with I-80 approached as they continued on. "Here's our yellow-brick road. Town should be on the other side of this underpass," Joel informed.

"Yellow-brick what now?"

Joel sighed, "Nevermind. You poor thing."

Tops of buildings came into view on the other side of the underpass, emerging out of the snow. Joel strained his ears for any hint of occupation, but was met only by the howl of icy wind. His hand hovered above his holster. Ellie moved into place on his heels, where she felt safe.

"With any luck, this place'll be deserted," he whispered.

The pair continued into the town, passing the decrepit remains of an abandoned gas station marked by a faintly yellow seashell logo. Ellie nudged Joel and gestured to the building. "Might be some supplies inside."

The windows of the gas station clung to their remaining shards of glass as snow drifted through them to collect on the floor. Joel and Ellie entered, handguns drawn, checking their corners.

"Clear," Joel barked.

"Here too. Let's see what we can find."

They moved through the aisles of the small convenience store, scavenging for anything that might be of use. The shelves were all but picked clean. Anything of value was now a hidden reward for the creative and thorough.

Ellie crept behind the counter and began rummaging through cabinets. Joel headed to the back where he guessed the office would be to find the door locked. A door that's still locked twenty years after the world has gone to shit usually marks a gold mine. Upon using his crude method of lockpicking, the door creaked open. Light poured in to reveal a pile of bones and an empty noose hanging from the ceiling. Joel flicked on his flashlight, illuminating the words GOD FORGIVE US ALL scrawled on the back wall of the office.

"Jesus..."

Fortunately, Joel's intrusion proved worthwhile. The previous occupant had apparently been hoarding supplies before he decided to end it all.

"Ellie!" Joel beckoned. She was there in an instant. "Check this out."

"Fuck..." she cringed at the scene, but her eyes widened at the bounty in the room. Shelves with cans of food, what Joel called a flint fire starter, a phial of antiseptic, and a bottle of alcohol.

"This ain't just any alcohol, though," Joel explained. "This here's a real find. Parker's Heritage," he read as he ran his thumb over the label. "Some of the best bourbon you're likely to come across. I can hardly believe this is real. I haven't had a sip of this in probably... 25 years..."

"What's bourbon?"

"I guess you'll just have to find out," he said with a grin. "I don't think anyone's enforcin' any underage drinkin' laws no more."

Her eyes lit up in anticipation, and subsequently dimmed a bit when Joel wrapped the bottle and gingerly placed it in his pack. "Later."

When they gathered all they could carry from the cache, they continued on into the heart of Laramie. The city, at first blush, seemed utterly lifeless. No tracks, no abandoned posts, no signs of human life anywhere. Ellie turned and started down a street marked East Ivinson Avenue when she stopped and chuckled to herself.

"This place remind you of anywhere?" she called back to Joel.

Joel came to meet her and looked down the avenue. It had a Main Street feel to it, quaint shops lining both sides. He turned to look the other direction and saw the steeple of a church towering above the distant tree line.

"Hmph. I didn't know any better, I'd say we're back in Lincoln."

"Yeah, but it's a Lincoln without that smartass dickhead. I like this one better. No Infected here..."

"You better knock on some wood, sayin' somethin' like that," Joel interrupted.

"What the fuck kind of good would that do?"

Joel sighed, "Nevermind. Poor thing."

* * *

People tend to pack up things they need when it all goes to hell. Things like clothes, medical supplies, any food they can carry. General survival needs. Glassware doesn't tend to make the cut, and Joel was pleased to find two lowballs tucked in the back of a kitchen cupboard.

They had picked this house for two reasons: windows were still boarded up, and it had a fireplace. After they had eaten a fairly flavorless meal, Joel left Ellie to watch the fire while he searched for something they could drink out of. It took no small amount of convincing for her to let him out of her sight, but the heat from the flames served as a ballast to keep her planted in front of the fireplace. She held out her hands to gather heat from the air when Joel walked in smiling.

"Found just what we need," he said, handing a glass to Ellie and taking a seat next to her. Ellie was impatient, clutching her cup and pestering Joel as he worked the cap off of the bottle of liquor. "Hold your horses or you ain't gettin' any." She wrinkled her face in artificial anger.

He put his nose up to the open spout of the bottle and drew in a deep, sweet breath. He let it linger in his nostrils and savored the aroma.

"C'mon c'mon c'mon!" Ellie nagged. Joel poured himself a healthy glass, and proceeded to pour Ellie a considerably more meager one. "That all? I have, like, fucking half of what you got!"

"Trust me, kiddo, you drink this much I'll be carryin' you. For the next couple days. I'll pop a goddamn stitch."

"Pffft." Ellie took a tentative sip. Her enthusiasm morphed to disgust immediately. "Blech... you actually _enjoy _this?"

"Bet your ass, I do," Joel said as he let the bourbon soak in his mouth. "Also offers the benefit of warmin' you up on a cold night."

This made Ellie reconsider the liquor, and she returned the glass to her lips. The second sip was no better than the first, but she feigned, "You know, on second thought, it's not bad." And Joel _was _right, it did seem warm her insides. She continued nursing the glass.

Joel smiled and stared at the flames, their movements entrancing him. This was one of those moments he wanted to soak in. They were so few and far between in a world so harsh. His gaze drifted to his little companion, sitting cross-legged and draped under a salvaged blanket, cradling her glass in both hands and doing a poor job to hide her distaste for the bourbon by following sips with forced smiles.

She giggled, "Hehehe... my lips are numb..."

Joel laughed. "Alright, then. That means it's time for you to hit the hay. Yeah, I reckon you'll sleep well tonight."

They watched the fire together and eventually drifted off next to empty glasses, warmed by alcohol, each other, and the fire before them.

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 6**


	6. Chapter 6 - Snowfall

**A/N: Here's the next entry to the story. We find Joel and Ellie, still on their journey from the Lakeside Resort to Salt Lake City. Had a good time writing this one, too. These characters are really fun to write. Having spent enough time in the game, their interactions in this story seem to flow so naturally. It's a pleasure to write! At first I was shooting to make this a 10 chapter story, but I'm just going to write enough to bring us to the highway in Salt Lake City. Don't know if that'll be more or less than 10 chapters, but I will not leave this story unfinished. Please read and let me know your thoughts!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it belongs to Naughty Dog.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 6**

**SNOWFALL**

"Get your fucking hands off me!" Ellie shouted, driving her fists into Joel's chest. The impact startled him awake to find Ellie frantically thrashing against him, deeply entwined in her latest nightmare.

"Ellie!" Joel shook her, attempting to free her from its grasp. "Ellie! Wake up! You're dreaming... you're just dreaming..."

Her eyes flew open in bewilderment. She struggled to identify the face before her, but once it registered that it was Joel her tension eased. "Oh fuck..." she whimpered.

"Shhh shhh shhh... it's all right... we're all right..." he soothed, pulling her in close.

"Oh man... oh man... that felt so... fucking real..." she lamented.

"Way you were hittin' me, I imagine it did."

The two lie together, waiting for their heartbeats to return to normal levels. Ellie lie with her head on Joel's chest, forcing herself to breathe evenly. The adrenaline slowly began to subside. She felt his chest rise and fall and tried to sync her breathing with his. A sense of calm overcame the sense of panic.

A loud thud and crash came from somewhere beneath the floorboards, followed by a bone-chilling clicking noise. _I forgot to check the goddamn basement_, Joel thought, mentally whipping himself for not being thorough enough.

"Joel-"

He cut off her whisper, holding a finger to his lips. He strained to hear reckless feet shuffling up a creaking staircase, accompanied by the horrible clicking. _Her scream. Bastard must have been asleep_. A disfigured hand was playing at the other side of the doorknob of the basement door. There was no time.

Joel threw the blanket completely over the both of them and positioned himself over Ellie, shielding her. She looked up at him with terror filling her eyes. The clicker managed to open the door and vomited a horrid screech, throwing sound across the room. Joel held completely still and listened. Haphazard footsteps reverberated off the walls as it approached. Ellie brought her hands up to cover her mouth and shut her eyes. It scuffled past between the fireplace and where they lay.

A floorboard creaked next to Ellie's head, and her eyes shot open. Joel found them with his own, and mouthed the words _just look at me, stay quiet_. She gave an almost undetectable nod. They remained motionless.

When the clicker had moved to the other side of the room, still seeking its prey, Joel reached down and pulled Ellie's switchblade out of her back pocket. Flicking it open, he rose as silently as possible and began making his way over to the Infected. As he approached, a floorboard beneath one of his boots let out a conspicuous creak.

The clicker spun to face him, sputtering clicks and shrieks from its gaping maw. Joel froze. The clicker tilted its head and listened as it shot noise around the room, trying to triangulate his position. Something flew past in the corner of Joel's eye, hitting the far wall and shattering loudly. It was a lowball glass. _Bless you, baby girl_. The clicker screeched at the impact, scrambling over to the corner where the glass had shattered. Joel snuck up behind it and buried Ellie's switchblade at the base of its skull. The beast screamed in agony, and Joel withdrew and struck again, driving the creature to the floor. He pulled the blade out again and stuck it in its throat. The gurgling noises eventually gave way to silence as the clicker fell motionless. Joel gave it another vicious stab in the skull for good measure, and rose to find Ellie at his back.

"Holy fucking shit... that was fucking intense..." she huffed, heart suddenly racing again.

"C'mon, we can't stay here," Joel insisted, wiping the switchblade, folding it and handing it back to her.

* * *

The winter wind nipped at his ears as Joel gazed down I-80. He closed his eyes and was back in Laramie, warm in front of the fire, glass of fine bourbon in hand. Freezing nights huddled up in a tent with Ellie on the side of the highway made it feel like it was months ago, not six days. A yellow road sign to his right demanded his attention. STRONG WIND POSSIBLE - NEXT 5 MILES.

"Well, shit..." he muttered. Ellie shivered by his side, hugging her arms in a feeble attempt to stay warm. "C'mon kiddo... next exit, we're takin' it. Any luck, we'll find a town."

"Any luck..." Ellie pondered to herself.

A couple hours of trudging and three slow miles later, they came across an underpass cutting beneath the highway. Besides a few dilapidated buildings just off the highway, it was anyone's guess whether there was a town nearby. Roads to the north and south just led into rolling hills.

"Which way are you thinkin'?" Ellie asked.

Joel sighed and ran a hand through his beard. He looked north. Nothing besides one lonely building. South, another lonely building. He saw a single peak rising from the horizon and, with no real reasoning, let that make up his mind.

"South... this way."

He studied the snow before them, trying to stay aimed at the ribbon of flattest snow where he guessed the road would be. They walked for some time, and he wondered if he had guessed the wrong way. They hadn't come across anything other than a crumbling building or two that wouldn't have provided much shelter. Scanning the sky, Joel reckoned they were due for a storm. Flakes began dancing on the wind minutes after the thought had left his head.

Just when he was about to give up and head back for the crumbling building, the land before them fell into a small valley, buildings peeking through the bare cottonwoods. It looked like a small, sleepy town; the kind Joel preferred.

"Guess we still got a little luck left..." Joel offered. Ellie just chattered her teeth in the cold.

They moved past a mostly-intact building that was too large to be a house. It was marked by a sign emerging from the snow that read "The Historic Elk Mountain Hotel."

"Place looks kinda fancy... let's go take a look around. Wonder if it's as fancy as the one in Pittsburgh," Ellie said eagerly as she trotted towards the front door.

Besides the collapsed porch at the front, the building didn't appear to be in too terrible of shape. Joel forced the door open and they peered inside, guns at the ready. The interior of the building was slightly disheveled, but much more intact than the hotel in Pittsburgh had been. Joel reckoned this small town a couple miles off of the highway had had far fewer looters and hunters pass through. Their entrance was met with a welcoming party of silence. Joel shut the door behind them and they began exploring the hotel.

Ellie turned this way and that, marveling at the luxurious accoutrements. She scurried over to a dusty wingback chair and ran her palms over the discolored upholstery. She sat down with a satisfied sigh, rubbing her arms on the armrests.

"Screw the Fireflies, let's stay here forever!" she jested.

Joel laughed, then considered the thought. It was a more appealing proposition than he thought at first blush. "Okay, kiddo... but for now, let's go pick a room. It looks like we have the run of the place."

The rooms were numbered and each bore an individual's name. Ellie's eyes glazed over the list. "What do you think?" she asked.

"Up to you. Try to pick one with a window that's intact."

Her eyes lit up at the opportunity. She hurried upstairs, Joel on her heels. She popped her head into the first couple of rooms but found they weren't to her liking. She came to the third room.

"Eliza Swain," she read from the room's name plate. "Who's that?"

"Don't have a damn idea. Take a look inside and see what you think."

Ellie turned the knob and eased the door open in apprehension. She gasped when the furnishings of the room met her eyes. The walls were a faded salmon hue, tattered drapes that had once been white hung over the windows, but the piece of furniture that really caught her eyes was the canopy-style bed.

"Wow..." she whispered. She walked forward and gently climbed onto the bed, not wanting to dishevel the faintly floral-patterned duvet. "This is it... this is the one."

Joel gave the room the once-over and shrugged. He would have gone for something a little more... gender-neutral. But he had given Ellie the honor of choosing, and he wasn't in a position to be picky anyways. He dropped their packs at the foot of the bed.

"Yeah, this'll do. Look, windows are still intact, too. We should stay warm tonight." He walked over to the other side of the bed and sat in front of the window, watching the snowfall. It had grown from flakes to clumps as the storm began to pick up. "We'll stay here until this storm passes."

Ellie moved to look over his shoulder. "Good. Because I'm not going outside during a fucking blizzard again. Ever."

Joel's brow furrowed and he reached back to pull Ellie up next to him, putting an arm around her shoulders. "You know I'd never make you do that."

She sat silently, lost in thought, staring out at the falling snow. After a few seconds she shook herself out of it and averted her eyes from the window. "Yeah, I know."

They sat on the edge of the bed for awhile, Joel staring ponderously at the snowfall, Ellie tracing the floral patterns of the duvet. Once again, their ruminations were interrupted by a growl from Ellie's stomach. She giggled in embarrassment. "Man, I really should put a muzzle on that thing."

Joel chuckled and mussed her hair. "C'mon. I think I saw a sign downstairs that said this place has its own restaurant. Let's go see if we can't rustle up some grub." He stood and began heading to the door.

Ellie looked up out the window again, eyes lingering there long enough to send a shiver down her spine. She brushed it off and fixed her ponytail. "Right behind you."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 7**


	7. Chapter 7 - Scars

**A/N: Here it is, chapter 7. Wanted to slow the story down a touch and refocus on these two wonderful characters. Hope you all enjoy it. Not much of an author's note here, but I don't have much to say. So... read and review! Stay tuned for chapter 8.**

**********DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 7**

**SCARS**

Morning's light crept it's way into the room until it began tickling at Ellie's eyelids. They fluttered for a few seconds and reluctantly opened. Outside the window, the world was white and formless. Stray flakes came to rest on the windowsill. Ellie groaned and rolled over to turn away from the whiteout, trying to clear her mind.

She had never slept in a bed quite like this. It seemed eager to devour her, wrapping her in luxurious comfort. It had actually been difficult to fall asleep at first, given that she was used to hard floors and healthy portions of discomfort. Now that morning had arrived through the snowstorm, there was nothing she would rather do than let the bed have it's way, burying her in a grave of cotton sheets and goose down. She nuzzled her face into Joel's arm.

Her nuzzling pulled Joel out of his mumbling sleep. His eyelids eventually climbed their way open. He looked down to Ellie at his side, wrapped in a cocoon of blankets, eyes shut with a slight smile on her face. He sighed and closed his eyes once more, not wanting to move, still enveloped in comfort of the sort he hadn't felt in twenty years. With no chance of travel today, sleeping in was not only acceptable, it was inevitable.

Joel listened to Ellie's breathing. It was much less shallow than it had been in the past couple of weeks, which meant her rib was improving. As the days passed, the pain from his side became more and more bearable, and his climb back from the brink of death was nearing completion. That climb wouldn't have been possible without Ellie. He turned to look at her once more. Not only had she been the one to stitch him up, care for him, and get him medicine, but she had been a source of strength to him. He knew how much pain she had been in as she recovered from her encounter with David, but she never complained, which he found rather uncharacteristic of a fourteen-year-old. She never let on or grumbled beyond the occasional curse word in a moment of exertion. It was rather admirable, actually. She was becoming a real fighter. A real survivor. Joel smiled, feeling some amount of pride.

He reached over to brush a stray lock of hair out of her face and tuck it behind her ear. His hand lingered, gently running his thumb over the scar on her right eyebrow. She stirred at the contact. Her eyes half-opened.

"Morning," she murmured groggily.

"G'mornin'," Joel responded. "Say, how'd you get this? If you don't mind me askin'."

Suddenly, she was miles away, reminiscing on a distant memory. "The military preparatory school in Boston wasn't my first. I had been in a couple before, but I always had this habit of picking fights."

"You don't say," Joel said, feigning surprise.

"Always managed to get into fights with kids twice my size, too. Needless to say, from time to time I got my ass handed to me. Once I had pushed my limits with the administrators, they'd transfer me to another school. Most kids that misbehaved as much as I did usually got thrown out of the zone, but for some reason, someone or something kept that from happening to me."

"How big was the kid that did this?" Joel said, passing over the scar again.

Ellie smiled. "I got this from running into a table when I was a little girl. Makes me look pretty badass though, right?"

Joel chuckled. "Pretty badass."

Slowly and wearily, they began dragging themselves out of the warm embrace of the bed. Joel threw off the covers and swung his legs off the side of the mattress, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. Ellie arched her back in a full-bodied stretch that lasted for a good ten seconds, making exaggerated squeaks and yawns in the process.

"Damn. I don't think I've ever felt so rested," she said, fighting to get the words past another yawn.

"I hear ya. I haven't had a night's sleep that good in ages. Man, I could sure go for a cup of coffee."

A look of excitement crossed Ellie's face. "That reminds me..." she trailed off, springing off of the bed. She went and rummaged through her pack for a few seconds and stood before Joel with her hands behind her back. "Close your eyes."

"Ellie, I don't like these kinds of games," Joel said, eyes remaining open and fixed on her.

"C'mon... close 'em. I swear it'll be worth it!"

Joel sighed and reluctantly shut his eyes.

"Hold out your hands."

"Ellie..."

"Hold. Out. Your. Hands."

Joel complied. After a second he felt the cool touch of a metal canister. He moved his hands over the container, trying to discern what she had handed him.

"Alright, open your eyes."

Joel's eyes opened and beheld something he thought he might never see again. It was an unassuming tin, free of any adornments except for a single word stamped across its broadest side: COFFEE. He shook it and listened. It wasn't empty. Ellie stood before him proudly, watching him earnestly. He was at a loss for words. He couldn't believe what he held in his hands, and came incredibly close to pinching himself. "Where did you..."

"I overheard you say how much you missed coffee when we were in that hotel in Pittsburgh. I've been looking for some ever since, but every container or tin I've come across has been empty or ruined. I found this in the kitchen last night when we were rummaging for food and thought it'd make a nice surprise. You like it?" she asked eagerly.

"Ellie, this is..." he started. His mind shot back to the last time he had been given a gift like this, and a twinge of sadness ran through his mind. Returning to the moment at hand, he looked up at Ellie and smiled. "Thank you," he said genuinely.

"You're welcome. So... how do we eat this stuff?" she asked. Joel's raucous laughter made her jump.

* * *

The wood from the broken chair crackled in the wood stove as Joel readjusted the pot of water. When spare furniture can double as firewood, it saves you trips into the harsh cold. Joel didn't believe much in old wives tales, and he kept his eyes on the pot, eagerly waiting for it to boil.

"So... let me see if I got this right: these used to be beans?"

"That's right. They grew inside little... cherry things."

"Okay. So people would toast the beans and then grind them up?"

"Mmm-hmmm."

"And then pour hot water onto them..."

"I know it sounds a bit crazy-"

"So it's just... bean water?" she asked incredulously.

Joel sighed. "In the simplest of terms, I suppose it is. But we call it coffee. Or java... cup of Joe... people have their own slangs for it. World used to practically run on the stuff."

"Who the hell is Joe?"

"No idea."

The water had finally come to a boil, and Joel removed it from the fire and added a couple generous scoops of the grounds and began stirring it in. Having sat on a shelf, sealed up for twenty years, he wasn't expecting the freshest or best-tasting cup, but it was going to be coffee and that's what mattered.

"Now, back in the day, people would pour this stuff through a filter so you didn't get any grounds in your cup. We don't have the luxury of filters so I'm gonna teach you how to make what we used to call 'cowboy coffee.'"

Joel let the grounds settle to the bottom and Ellie watched intently as he poured the steaming liquid into two mugs they had managed to find. He took care not to let any grounds make their way into the cups. When he had finished, he handed her a mug.

"See? Simple as that," he said as he held his mug to his nose and drew in a deep breath. "Damn... never thought I'd smell that again." Ellie did the same and went to take a sip before Joel stopped her. "Hold your horses, that's gonna be real hot. You don't want to burn yourself."

Ellie sat impatiently, fidgeting while waiting for the mysterious beverage to cool. She scanned the walls of the foyer, pausing on each faded photograph. Faces of men that history had forgotten looked back at her, and losing some nerve, she looked away. Her eyes drifted to the old grandfather clock in the corner, and she rose and sauntered over to it.

"Wonder if this thing still works..." she said to herself.

She opened the front pane, pulled the pendulum to one side and released it. She watched it sway back and forth for a couple minutes, the accompanying ticking noises mesmerizing her.

Joel beckoned her to return, as the coffee was safe to drink by now. He took a long sip and smacked his lips. "Mmmmmm-mmmmmm... it's been too long, old friend."

Ellie followed suit, placing the mug to her lips. She took in a small sip and immediately regretted her decision. The liquid was bitter and, to her palate, rather foul. Not wanting to be seen spitting it out, she forced herself to swallow. "Guh... what is it with you and drinks that taste like shit?"

Joel laughed. "Well, no one enjoys their first taste of coffee. It has to grow on you. It has its benefits, too. It'll warm you up, like bourbon but in a different way. Usually has caffeine in it too, which gives you energy, but I'm sure this stuff is too stale to have any left."

The fact that it was a fairly subpar cup of coffee didn't hinder Joel from enjoying it immensely. Ellie, on the other hand, struggled to choke down the bitter concoction. She had been able to at least somewhat conceal her distaste for the bourbon, but she couldn't stop the grimaces that followed each sip this time. "Ugh... this is worse than the bourbon."

"That gives me an idea," Joel said, opening his pack. Ellie watched in disbelief as he proceeded to add a shot of bourbon to his coffee. "A little extra 'good morning' to me." He gestured to offer some to Ellie.

"No, thanks. I'd rather not die of disgust," she retorted.

Ellie's eyes drifted to the window. The storm was still going strong, and the world beyond the weathered panes was obscured in a white haze. She felt her mind begin to drift as she stared at the snow. She wanted to look away, but the haunted memories started to take hold. _Where you goin' Ellie? This is my town._ She could hear his taunting voice. Despite the warmth of the coffee and the fire, she shivered. She felt the winter wind biting her cheeks, the blinding snow that stung at her eyes, but overshadowing all of those was the icy loneliness that had crept its way into her veins. She didn't hear Joel's voice.

"Ellie... Ellie?" Her mind was still consumed by the whiteout. Joel rose from his seat and made his way over to where she was, curled up on the wingback chair, eyes frozen on the window. He reached out a hand and gently placed it on her shoulder. "Ellie?"

The contact made her jump, spilling what was left on her coffee on her lap. "Fuck!" she cried, observing her stained jeans.

"Sorry... sorry... you alright?"

"Yeah. I'm fine," she insisted.

"C'mon. Let's see if we can find you some dry pants."

Her eyes met the window again, but she shook herself free before the memories could grasp at her again. "Okay..."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 8**


	8. Chapter 8 - Reflections

**A/N: If I'm being honest, I struggled a lot with this chapter. It gets into some of the heavier themes of The Last of Us, themes that are difficult to wrestle with. In exploring these themes, I also had to give a nod to the other GOTY nominee (in my book) Bioshock Infinite. I felt like the theme in question was interesting to put into the context of the world of The Last of Us. What theme am I talking about? Read below and see if you can find out. So I had originally mentioned 10 chapters for this, but I'm thinking it'll have to be at least 15 now. We still have a lot of road to cover between Elk Mountain, WY and Salt Lake City. I'm struggling to keep true to the game in matters of continuity, both in events that happen as well as where Joel and Ellie's relationship is by the time they reach SLC. Anyways, read, enjoy, and review!**

**DISCLAIMER: Because some people have asked, no this will not be shifting to JoelxEllie... not now, not ever. Why? Because that's icky. Any love between these characters is of the father-daughter variety. Not romantic. The fact that I need to clarify this gives me the willies.**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 8**

**REFLECTIONS**

Ellie ran her palms over the coarse fabric of the tan cargo pants. These would certainly take a bit of getting used to, but beggars can't be choosers. They were lucky enough to find pants that fit at all. Her trusty jeans had seen her through thick and thin, but for now they hung to dry, draped over the curtain rod in the bathroom, complete with a garish brown stain that would likely remain for the rest of time in a world that had forgotten the glory of laundry detergent.

Joel knocked on the door to their suite. "You decent?" he called.

"I guess so," she said absently.

He entered, a few shirts draped over one arm. He grabbed them to hand them to her. "Found these a couple doors down while you were changin'. A couple of 'em got short sleeves, but they'll be good for layering," he said as he handed her a faded red flannel shirt and another red shirt with thin white vertical stripes. "Oh, I did manage to find one long sleeve shirt, too. Here." He handed her a grey thermal.

Ellie looked over each of the shirts. She held up the red flannel, looking it over. It reminded her of him. He always had a thing for plaid. She hid her smile behind the wall of the shirt. "Thanks."

She folded the shirts into small bundles and packed them away in her backpack. Her mind was still wandering, drifting back to the lakeside resort. She thought back to the cold nights, shivering curled up next to Joel, not knowing whether he'd still be breathing in the morning. Her mind kept straying to the 'what if' scenarios. What if he hadn't made it? What if she had been left alone in the world, abandoned in a state she didn't know, with no one to confide in but the howling winter wind? She probably would have given up and let winter pull her into an icy grave. She shuddered.

This mission they were on made her feel like she had a purpose; like her life meant something. _Everything happens for a reason._ But what she didn't realize, or wouldn't admit to herself, is that what she actually wanted, more than a purpose, more than her life to have meaning, was love. She wanted a relationship that would last, one that would stand the trials and the test of time. She was unfortunate enough to live in such a world that a relationship such as that is extremely hard to come by, both through a combination of high mortality rates and people generally distrusting one another. Trust was a valued and rare commodity in this world. A long life even more valued and more rare.

She was cautiously starting to let herself believe that maybe, just maybe, Joel could provide her with that relationship, but she was still terrified that she would somehow end up alone. She remembered the oath he made the night she woke up from that nightmare in an empty basement. She thought he had left her. _Oh, baby girl. That will never happen._ The words resonated in her thoughts. She knew he meant it, and merely reminiscing on the words brought the burning of tears behind her eyes. He had called her 'baby girl.' It seemed to her like the kind of phrase a father would use to comfort his daughter. She wondered if he had ever used that term of endearment with Sarah. Was Joel becoming the father that she never had? A small pang of guilt ran through her as she thought about Sarah. She didn't want to infringe on that relationship, as that bond was sacred and obviously very dear to Joel. Tears had overcome her eyelids and began tracing silent paths down her cheeks.

Joel looked up from rummaging through his pack to find Ellie standing there, left arm holding the elbow of her right, quietly sniffling. Silently, she reached up to wipe away a tear. She wasn't doing a very good job of keeping it together.

"Hey... hey... where's this comin' from?" he asked tenderly as he moved over to her, concern palpable in his voice.

She wanted to express how she felt, but had no idea how. She wanted to tell him that he was all she had, but the words wouldn't form in her mouth. All she could manage to do was wrap her arms around him and add a few more tear stains to his shirt. He drew her in close and hugged her tight. Through the poorly-controlled but quiet sobbing, she managed to get out the words, "Th-thank you..."

"Ellie... it was just a couple shirts..."

Ellie couldn't help but let a stifled laugh sneak out between sobs. Joel looked down at her and wiped a tear off of her cheek. This little girl had shown him more humanity in less than a year than he had seen during the entire CBI pandemic. Her sweet naïveté, earnest fascination with the world, and fighting spirit had begun to thaw a heart that Joel thought would never feel warmth again. If he was being honest with himself, he was starting to truly see Ellie as his daughter. It was a thought he struggled with, even if he didn't realize that it was what he was longing for. He felt the uninvited twinge of guilt enter his mind again. Would Sarah forgive him if she knew he had found someone to perhaps fill the void she had left in his life? Could he forgive himself for replacing his dearly departed with some kind of surrogate?

As he looked into her welled-up green eyes, the inner conflict stifled him. He wanted to tell her what she meant to him, but the words wouldn't come. He wanted to tell her that he loved her, but the ache of guilt muzzled his mouth.

Through all of the words their mouths were unable to form, as they looked at one another, their eyes spoke more than any feeble words could have. Without uttering a single word, they came to a silent understanding of what they meant to each other.

After some time, Ellie's eyes fell and her mind returned to a question that had been burdening her, "Do you think we can... redeem... the things that we've done?"

Joel remained quiet for a long time, eyes searching the distance for the words to say. "I haven't thought... much about redemption. I reckon... at this point, it ain't somethin' I deserve. Now, I can go and say somethin' like 'Everything I've done, I did to survive'... and to an extent that's true... but..." he trailed off, mind consumed in thought. "Other times... I wonder if it's true at all..."

She lifted her eyes to study his, finding a look of grief as he reminisced on the atrocities of his past. Her gaze fell to her own hands, reflecting on her own atrocities, the dozens of lives she had taken. Lives of people, just like her, doing whatever it takes to survive. People who likely had loved ones that would never see them again. She couldn't help but dwell on it, no matter how many times Joel insisted she shouldn't. "I'm a fucking monster," she muttered, barely audible.

Joel's keen ear picked up the words, and he knelt and took her by the shoulders. "Hey, you listen to me," he said firmly, trying to provide reassurance. His eyes sought hers, but they wouldn't heed. "Sometimes... sometimes life gives you a shitty hand, and your only play is to do the unthinkable or roll over and die. And there's no other choice. We didn't go looking for blood, it found us. We did what we had to, and that's all we can say."

"I don't know if I can live with that," she replied weakly, staring at her feet.

Joel sighed. Ellie was broken. The fight had left her, and it was this God-forsaken world's fault. He felt a boil of rage deep inside him. Rage that was first directed at the Infected, the hunters, and the primal, ruthless savagery that now ruled the world. He looked at this little girl who had been learning in his shadow. Learning how to scavenge, how to survive. Learning how to kill. At that moment the rage realigned and focused on himself. Everything Ellie had become was a small reflection of himself, and for the moment, he hated himself for it. _ The killer in me is the killer in you_, he thought, recalling a song he had long forgotten the name of. The anger burned at his mind. He felt responsible. He had put her in this situation.

"Look... Ellie..." he started. "You just... You gotta find something to... live for. Something to fight for." In his mind he knew that she had become his something.

Ellie's mind raced, as she found herself absentmindedly rubbing the scar on her right forearm. "Redemption," she whispered. "Maybe this vaccine can be the redemption for the things that I've done," she said aloud. "Maybe that's what I can keep fighting for."

Joel was slightly disheartened that her answer wasn't him, but deemed the vaccine a more worthy cause to live for than some broken old man who longed for his daughter. There was likely no hope of redemption for him, but there sure as hell was for this little girl. He resolved to join her in fighting for it. Get to Salt Lake City, doctors draw some blood, he and Ellie return to Jackson to live out their lives together, and Ellie has her redemption. Hell, maybe helping her could be some form of redemption for him after all. "Sure, we'll see it through. Together."

The simple word brought a smile to her face. "Together."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 9**


	9. Chapter 9 - Desolation

**A/N: Alright, longer delay between chapters than normal, but hey, life is busy. Once again, thank you all for the overwhelmingly positive responses and reviews to this! Slowly but surely, we're making our way to Salt Lake City. The last few chapters have been somewhat uneventful, but that's all about to change in a big way. Hope you all enjoy this one, and I'll see you next chapter.**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own the Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 9**

**DESOLATION**

Everything was white. As far as the eye could see, white, in every direction. The only things breaking the vast sheet of pure white were the two lone figures, trudging deep scars into the snow as they went.

It was a significant distance between Elk Mountain and the next sizeable town, so Joel had made sure that they use any supplies they could scavenge from the hotel to bundle up accordingly. They had added as many layers as they could and fashioned scarves out of disused blankets, wrapping their heads and leaving only their eyes exposed to the harsh conditions.

Joel strained his eyes to see the tops of mile markers emerging out of the snow; the only beacons keeping them on the right path, aside from the occasional road sign. Southern Wyoming in winter was a vast plane of nothingness. No trees, no mountains, just endless rolling prairie covered in a thick layer of powder. It was the kind of landscape that made getting lost a real and dangerous possibility. If the mile markers succumbed to the ever rising snow they would be aimless.

Ellie traipsed along silently a few steps behind Joel, lost in her thoughts. He knew where her mind was, but had no idea what to say to her. She likely wasn't too interested in talking about it anyway. But the silence was eating away at his resolve.

"You alright?" he chanced. His words were met with silence. He wasn't sure if she had heard him, and turned back to face her. "Ellie?"

She looked up at him blankly. "Huh?"

"You alright?"

"Besides fucking freezing? I'm fine," she responded before returning her eyes to the snow before her.

"Okay. It's just... you seem kind of quiet, is all."

"Oh. Well, there's not exactly a lot to comment on out here."

They resumed their arduous walking. Joel wasn't really the conversational type, but he felt the need or obligation to help take Ellie's mind off of what was troubling her. His mind searched for something to talk about. To his surprise, it was Ellie who broke the silence.

"So... what'd you do? Before, I mean."

"Whaddaya mean?"

"Like... for a living."

"Ah. Tommy and I worked in construction together."

"Building houses?"

"Yeah... houses, barns, sometimes commercial properties. We'd take any contract we could find."

"Did you enjoy it?"

He considered the question. "I reckon I couldn't complain. Work could be hard to come by from time to time but it put food on the table. It was hard work, but the hardest part about it was..." he paused, as his mind hung on the thought, "... being away from Sarah so much."

"I can imagine..." she said, pensively studying the snow.

A road sign was approaching, and immediately following it the land sunk into a small valley.

"North Platte River," Ellie read aloud. "How close is that to... what's the next town? Rawlins?"

"That's right. Lemme see here," Joel replied, pulling out the map of Wyoming he had nabbed at the hotel. "Looks like we got another fifteen miles or so. We'll hit Rawlins sometime tomorrow, if we're lucky."

Ellie sighed in frustration. "Guess that means another night in 'the Ten.'"

"The what?"

"Our shitty tent. I figured it's not quite a full tent, so the name seemed appropriate."

Joel huffed a chuckle to himself. This might be as close as he gets to hearing her tell one of her jokes again, so he savored it. "Alright then. Let's get across."

There were two bridges spanning the North Platte, one for each direction of travel. The decks of both bridges had collapsed years ago, and that left Joel and Ellie searching for a safe way across the seemingly frozen river. The collapsed road surface protruded from the ice in certain areas, but it was probably safer to try to cross on the ice itself.

"This looks like as good a spot as any," Joel said after settling on a patch of frozen river that was free of any debris or visible fractures. "C'mon kiddo."

He tentatively placed a boot on the ice and eased his weight onto it. The ice crunched beneath his boot, but it seemed to just be superficial. To his relief, there was no deep cracking sound.

"Why don't you let me go first?" Ellie asked. "I weigh next to nothing compared to you."

"If the ice can support me, it can support you. I don't want you going through it."

"Well I don't want _you_ going through it either..."

"Least I can swim, if that happens. Besides, I've gone through the ice once before and lived to tell the tale."

Ellie resigned her argument and the pair continued their tense journey across the ice. The North Platte wasn't too wide here, but every step was laced with apprehension as they strained to hear any cracking of the ice.

"When did you go through the ice?" Ellie asked.

"One winter in Boston, coming back from a smuggling run with..." he trailed off, hanging on the memory. He cleared his throat. "Tess and I were on our way back from meetin' with Bill. Our usual route back into the city was compromised, so I made the brilliant suggestion of crossin' the Charles River. Needless to say, I went through, nearly died of hypothermia. Tess... she... she saved my life..."

Ellie continued on, matching her footsteps with Joel's. A pang of guilt over Tess ran through her once more. Joel had tried to relieve her of the guilt, but Ellie still felt like it was her fault that Tess was dead. She was deep in thought, and didn't notice the deep, loud cracking noise.

Joel spun to face her, and saw the fractures spidering out from her right foot. She noticed them too, and looked up to meet Joel's gaze. The fear in her eyes was tangible. "Joel-"

"Give me your hand," he cut her off, reaching out to her. Her hand found his just as the ice gave way beneath her, and he was able to lift her out of danger at the last second. "C'mon, we're gettin' off this damn ice."

Throwing caution to the wind, he began to run, pulling Ellie along behind him like a leaf on the wind. The cracking was prevalent now, and every step was an epicenter, shooting fractures across the ice in all directions. The opposite bank was approaching quickly, and with every stride, Joel prayed they wouldn't plunge into the icy depths.

Finally, Joel's boots hit the opposite bank, and he clambered up the incline, Ellie in tow. When they had reached the top, they sat in the snow to catch their breath.

"That was too damn close," Joel remarked between exhausted breaths. Open, rushing water was visible in patches where they had run across, patches where ice had been a minute earlier. He turned to look at the road ahead. "Alright kiddo, we best keep movin'."

They covered another few miles before the sky took on a darker hue as the sun began to set, obscured behind the overcast clouds. Joel began clearing snow so they could set up 'the Ten,' and Ellie helped until she couldn't feel her fingers. The howling wind that seemed omnipresent in this southern Wyoming winter had died down to a breeze, and the two were thankful for it. Setting up the slipshod tent was much easier without having to fight the wind.

Ellie looked on as Joel unrolled and spread out the sleeping bag. "So... people use to camp out like this... for fun?"

"Well, they usually had equipment that was in workin' order, but yeah."

"Sounds fucking miserable."

"I never liked winter camping much, but during the rest of the year, it was kinda nice," Joel recalled. He had taken Sarah camping on numerous occasions, and it had provided some of his fondest memories.

Ellie noticed the glint in his eyes and gathered that he was reminiscing on happier times. She crawled over the nylon floor to sit next to him on the sleeping bag. She looked up at the torn flap of the tent, haphazardly flapping in the breeze. "Well... it could be worse."

"We're lucky to have a tent at all, and a sleeping bag for that matter. We wouldn't make it otherwise." He rummaged through his pack, pulling out the bottle of Parker's Heritage. "Got a bit of bourbon left, you feel like warmin' your bones?"

To Ellie's surprise, she had actually started developing an affinity for the stuff. "Absolutely."

"We need the calories for tomorrow. Hopefully we can scrounge up some food in Rawlins," Joel said, pulling down his scarf and taking a sip and passing the bottle to Ellie. It had been two days since they had eaten the last of their canned beans.

"Agh, I hope so. I'm starving." She took a small sip as well, savoring it instead of just choking it down.

The sun continued its descent beyond the horizon and the prairie was engulfed in darkness. Joel and Ellie crawled into the sleeping bag and huddled up for the frigid night.

* * *

Joel had kept the treasured tin of coffee, but lamented that he left the mugs behind at the hotel. A hot beverage would have helped on a boreal morning such as this. He crept out of the sleeping bag, as not to wake Ellie, and searched the area, hoping to find something combustible. Alas, everything was covered in snow, and the search was fruitless.

By the time he returned, Ellie was stirring in the sleeping bag. "Morning," she squeaked as she stretched.

"Morning. You ready to keep at it?"

"Mmmph. Five more minutes," she said, burying her face in the sleeping bag. Joel didn't have the heart to refuse.

"Okay, kiddo."

An hour later they were back on the snow-covered highway, slightly less weary after a night's rest. Another day of monotonous travel, following the trail of mile markers along I-80. The trudging was agonizing, the cold was bitter, and the wind had picked up to biting levels.

After a couple hours, tall spires began emerging over the horizon. As they approached, they took the form of chimneys.

"What's that?" Ellie inquired.

"Looks like an old oil refinery," Joel surmised.

They approached the refinery, walking along the frontage road beside it. It seemed to stretch on forever behind the chainlink fence. Finally, they reached the gate to the facility, which was adorned with the word SINCLAIR.

"I don't think this is Rawlins..." Joel said.

The loud crack of a gunshot startled him, as he felt the air from the bullet as it tore past. His eyes searched the buildings and catwalks for movement, but the place was a gunman's paradise. He turned to pull Ellie behind cover, but found her lying on her back, the snow tainted red near her left arm.

"ELLIE!"

He reached down and grabbed the collar of her jacket, dragging her behind cover before the next bullet struck the snow where her chest had been. Her mouth hung open and her eyes darted around in bewilderment.

"Ellie! Ellie, stay with me!" Joel shouted, as he propped her against the brick wall and began examining her arm. The bullet had just winged her, leaving a bright red gash peering out through her jacket sleeve.

"Motherfucker!" Ellie yelled, upon regaining her faculties.

Joel quickly pulled off his scarf and began wrapping the gunshot wound tightly. Once he had staunched the bleeding, he moved into position to seek out their unseen attacker. They were pinned down, had no angle on him, and Ellie was hurt. Joel counted three rounds for the scoped hunting rifle.

"Here goes nothing..."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 10**


	10. Chapter 10 - Sinclair

**A/N: Alright, time for some action! I know some of you are thinking "UGH finally, gunfights, death, and glory!" This is to shut you up. No, I'm just kidding. We just needed some tension here.**

**Thank you all once more for the excessively kind words you've given me about this fanfic. Y'all know how to make someone feel good about themselves, so well done you.**

**I'm definitely still leaning to stretching this to 15 chapters, but it might be less too.**

**Also, wanted to announce that at the completion of this fanfic I am planning on starting Aftermath: Part II, which will take place right after the end of the game. With this story, I'm constrained to the narrative we know, and have to keep continuity. There's going to be much less restriction when I write that story, and I'm really, really looking forward to writing without a fixed end point I have to reach. As always, I'll do my best to remain true to these two beautiful characters.**

**Anyway, please read, enjoy, and review!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 10**

**SINCLAIR**

The gunfire had come from somewhere on the north end of the sprawling facility. Joel carefully peered around the gate and scanned the distance, looking for any signs of movement or the glint of a scope catching the light. Nothing on the rooftops. The catwalk spanning the street seemed clear as well.

"I got nothin'," Joel said to Ellie, who was still leaning with her back against the brick pillar of the gate. "I'm gonna have to try to get the angle on him."

He took stock of his supplies. Beyond the three rifle rounds, he had five bullets in the revolver, four for the 9mm, and one shotgun shell. A handful of nails and gunpowder he could fashion into a nail bomb if he could get his hands on a can. He took out the bottle with the remaining bourbon and handed it to Ellie.

"Here, this'll take the edge off."

Ellie took the bottle and downed the rest of the liquor, grimacing as it burned through her chest. Joel extended the hunting rifle to her.

"All right... I'm gonna see if I can't get him to give away his position. You get eyes on him, you take him out, yeah?"

"Sure."

Joel hesitated. "This ain't like Pittsburgh. You got three rounds and that's it. Make 'em count-"

"Joel, I fucking know," Ellie cut him off, scowling through the pain as she tested the weight of the rifle with her wounded arm.

"All right," he said, readying himself. "I'm gonna go for the far side of the gate. He'll likely take a shot. Get in position and see if you can spot him."

Ellie rolled to her knees and readied the rifle, waiting for Joel to bolt so she could peer around the pillar in search of the gunman. He looked back at her. She was a tough little cuss, rifle up and at the ready, shrugging off a bullet wound better than a lot of grown men he'd seen.

She turned to meet his gaze. "What are you waiting for? It's time to fucking move!"

"Watch yourself."

"You too."

Joel took a quick peek around the pillar, then poised himself and darted across the gate. As soon as he left his position, Ellie swung the rifle around the pillar and scanned the distance for muzzle flash. The small burst of light came milliseconds before the crack of gunfire, and Ellie fixated on its origin at the end of one of the far catwalks.

"I got 'em," she called to Joel. "Third catwalk down the street, left end." She focused her gaze through the scope, but couldn't make out a silhouette of a body. "I got no shot."

"All right. Bastard's a good shot," Joel said, examining the tattered fabric on the top of his pack where the bullet had gone through. "Don't fire until you have a clear shot on him. He notices you, you hide, got it?"

"Let's get this fucker," is all she said in response.

Joel turned and headed around the outside of the building next to the gate, looking to hop the fence at try to flank the attacker. He strained his ears, hoping to hear a near gunshot rather than a distant one, but there was just silence. He reached a gap in the chainlink fence and crawled beneath it.

The refinery was a maze of brick buildings, pipelines, railings and catwalks. There seemed to be innumerable ways to get from one point to another, which he figured both an advantage and a disadvantage. There were several ways to advance or retreat, but also several ways to be flanked yourself, and there was no indication whether or not this gunman was alone.

Joel vaulted over a concrete barrier and through a window into a large brick building that stood between him and their attacker. The building was dark and cluttered with broken cubicles and furniture. Joel left his flashlight off as not to alert anyone who might be hunting him, making the journey through the building a bit treacherous.

He hadn't been this far away from Ellie since the lakeside resort, and her absence was prevalent in his mind. His instinct pulled at every step, urging him to return to protect her, but he kept reminding himself how capable she was. She was also a crack shot, so she was in the perfect position.

He peered over a windowsill on the second floor. There was no direct line of sight to the far end of the third catwalk, so he leapt over the window and crouched, slowly strafing to try to lay eyes on their attacker. Eventually, the gunman's roost came into view. He was still scanning the end of the street near the gate, but apparently didn't have a shot on Ellie either. He had set up sandbags around his position, and all Joel could see was a sliver of his head and the protruding gun barrel.

The hunter had wisely blocked off the rear approach to his position. The only way to reach his position was to climb the stairs on the other side of the catwalk and cross it, an easily defendable position from the hunter's perspective. Joel scanned the surrounding area for anything he could use to distract the hunter or get him to flee the roost, giving Ellie a clear shot. What he would have given for the supplies to craft a Molotov in that moment.

Then, this being an oil refinery, he noticed a barrel at the base of the catwalk. The barrel had the universal symbol for "flammable" and "explosive" prominently displayed on its side. Joel prayed the barrel wasn't empty, drew the revolver slowly, and took aim at the barrel. _Hope you're ready for this, kiddo._ He figured what he was about to do was probably safe enough. There couldn't be much oil left in the surrounding parts of the refinery after all those years. The explosion should be mostly contained. He hoped.

Focusing the iron sights on the broadest part of the barrel, he slowly squeezed the trigger. The shot rung his ears, but it paled in comparison to the blast that followed. The exploding barrel tore through the support of the catwalk, and the rusted metal began to groan under the newly unsupported weight. Joel saw the hunter catch his balance and then briefly consider his options. Apparently deciding it was the best idea to flee to the far side of the catwalk, he took off running. He had made it three strides before the bullet ripped an uninvited path from his cheekbone to the opposite side of his skull. He was dead before he hit the catwalk.

Through the ringing in his ears, Joel could barely make out Ellie's distant exultations. "Holy shit! I fucking got him! Did you see that Joel?" Joel looked back at the corpse, admired the feat, and raised a thumb in Ellie's direction. He tried to find her silhouette at the end of the street, but she must have hunkered down after he had left her. In his bewilderment, he hadn't heard the footsteps on the catwalk stairs. The last thing he remembered was the distant cry of "Watch out!" before the butt of the shotgun turned the whole world to black.

* * *

The world had gone from white to black, and now had begun transitioning to dark grey as he slowly regained consciousness. The first thing he saw, to his overwhelming relief, was a pair of emerald eyes.

"Joel? C'mon, wake up!" she was shaking him.

His head felt like the bullet had hit him rather than the hunter, and he let out a loud groan. "Ellie... wh-what happened?"

His vision slowly returned and he sat up to find Ellie on her knees beside him, cradling the hunting rifle. Over her shoulder he saw the bodies of three hunters.

"You got jumped by a couple more hunters. One of those fuckers cracked you on the head with a shotgun," she said, and looked down at the rifle. "I took them out with my last two rounds."

He put his hands to his head, willing the pain to leave but knowing it would probably linger for quite some time. He looked over at the bodies again. She _was_ a crack shot, as he saw ragged, claret holes on each head. "Thanks for savin' my ass."

"Hey, it was either you or them, right?" she said with a smirk, conjuring a chuckle out of Joel, followed by a grimace of pain.

"We should move. We're not safe, exposed out here like this," he said, scanning the catwalks and buildings around them.

Ellie helped him to his feet and they made their way back to the building Joel had clambered through earlier. Joel slumped into a desk chair and rubbed his temples, still groggy from the blow to the head. Ellie plopped down on a nearby desk and began unwrapping the scarf cinched around the gunshot wound.

"Ah... fuck," she seethed through gritted teeth. "That stings like hell."

"Here, let me," Joel said, moving over to her. He reached into his pack and pulled out his canteen and a clean cloth. After rinsing the gash, he applied some antiseptic they had scavenged from the gas station in Laramie and redressed the wound.

"Thanks," Ellie said. "How's your head?"

"Hurts like hell. Wishin' we still had some of that bourbon left."

"Well, hey, if it makes you feel any better, it _did_ take the edge off."

Joel huffed a muffled laugh. "Good. Let's see if there's anything in this building worth takin', and then get the hell out of here."

Beyond a full roll of duct tape and a couple of box cutter blades, there wasn't much else worth grabbing out of the building. Joel and Ellie cautiously emerged from the building and returned to the winter cold. The area was quiet and clear, with no signs of additional hunters.

"C'mon," Joel beckoned. "We got five miles to Rawlins."

They returned to I-80, the refinery's chimneys retracting into the horizon behind them. Another two hours of trudging and they had reached the outskirts of Rawlins, Wyoming. Four different hotels greeted them at the entrance to the town.

"Go on, take your pick. Fair warnin' though, these won't be like the one in Elk Mountain... or the one in Pittsburgh for that matter. These are your run-of-the-mill eco-suites," he said, observing the faded signs of the Holiday, Hampton, Days and Comfort Inns.

"Mmmmm... Comfort. I could go for some of that," Ellie said as she began walking toward it. Joel smiled to himself and followed after her.

Ellie was slightly disheartened that the inn didn't quite live up to its name. The beds were much firmer than the ones in the Elk Mountain Hotel, and the dusty pillows were stiff and itchy. She longed for the goose down duvet and plush mattress. Joel gave Ellie the right side of the bed so that her wounded arm had plenty of room and he took the side closest to the door, as usual. She gingerly crawled onto the mattress, cradling the arm against her chest.

"Ah... ah... fuck. I got shot you know," she jested, motioning to her arm, "right here."

Joel chuckled. "Yeah, sure did."

"Remind me to never get shot again," she said as she eased herself down.

"Heh. Alright, kiddo." He noticed her reach her right arm across to massage her ribs. "How's that rib doin'?"

She shrugged, "Same old, same old, right? It's getting there, slowly but surely. Tweaked it today while saving your ass."

Joel frowned. "Sorry about that."

"Pshh... you should be! I'm hurting enough already! I got shot you know, right here!" she motioned proudly to her wound again.

"That scar will be a badge of honor one day. You can tell all your friends you got shot."

Ellie grew quiet. _ All your friends_, she thought. The only friends she'd had were dead or gone. Riley was dead. Sam was dead. Marlene was god-knows-where. The icy chill of loneliness began to encroach on her again. She looked over at Joel to halt its advance. "Yeah."

He noticed the pensive expression on her face and reached over to tuck the perpetually rebellious lock of hair behind her ear. "Let's get some rest, alright?"

"Alright," she said, closing her eyes.

Joel waited until her breathing had deepened and slowed, brushed her hair once more, and whispered, "Night, baby girl," before drifting off to sleep himself.

Tonight's dream was a new one.

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 11**


	11. Chapter 11 - Epiphany

**A/N: All right, Chapter 11, here we go. This chapter might be my favorite out of the whole story so far. Dreams give you the ability to create some very interesting turns of events. They allow scenarios to play out that could never happen, and things don't have to make sense because they rarely do in dreams. So yeah, I had a ton of fun writing this chapter.**

**This is going to start sounding redundant, but I wanted to say thank you again to all the people who have taken time to read this whole story and offer their kind words or criticisms. I really do appreciate it. Please enjoy the chapter!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 11**

**EPIPHANY**

"Daddy, what about Uncle Tommy?" Sarah asked.

"We're gonna get you to safety and go back for him, okay?"

The dream seemed to follow the same formula as it always had. The perpetually endless running, finally reaching the edges of the military checkpoint, the soldier stopping them.

He was talking on his radio, something low and quiet. Joel swore he could make out the words "sir - there's a little girl."

"Listen, buddy, we've just been through hell." He hoped to glean some compassion from the armed guard. "We just need-" Suddenly, light was blinding him as the soldier fixed his sights on Joel and his daughter. "Oh, shit-"

_Here it comes_, he thought.

He heard a crack of gunfire, but felt no sting of bullets. The gunfire... it didn't sound like a military-spec automatic rifle. It sounded like... a hunting rifle. Joel risked a look at the soldier just in time to see him slouch to his knees, falling over dead. He gave Sarah the once over. She was fine. No bullet holes, no spreading pool of blood on her stomach, no agonizing squeals of pain. She was fine.

A voice in the distance, "Holy shit! I fucking got him! Did you see that, Joel?"

"E-Ellie?" Joel said aloud, dumbfounded.

"Who's Ellie?" Sarah asked, looking around in confusion.

Sure enough, Ellie came trotting up from behind them, scoped hunting rifle that was as tall as she was cradled in her arms.

"You guys all right?"

How was she here? This was impossible. How was Sarah still drawing breath? It's... _impossible_. Joel's mind struggled with the logical inconsistencies. He stared blankly at Ellie, thoroughly befuddled. Sarah looked at him and back at Ellie.

"We're fine," Sarah nodded. Joel continued staring in silence, not knowing what to say. "Excuse my dad's manners. I'm-"

"Sarah..." Ellie's eyes opened wide at the epiphany.

"How did you-"

"Joel... he's... he's told me about you," Ellie said somberly, sadness evident in her eyes.

"Oh. And you're... Ellie?"

Ellie smiled and nodded, softly replying, "Yeah."

"How do you two know-"

"It's a long story," Ellie replied simply, looking at Joel.

At that moment, Tommy came jogging down the path, revolver in hand. He stopped in his tracks. "... Ellie?"

"Tommy?" Ellie said, surprised.

This was all getting too weird, and the cognitive dissonance was taking a toll on Joel, who still hadn't said anything.

"Sarah... you're... you're alright," Tommy said with disbelief, also grappling with the mental acrobatics, and crossing to where Joel was standing with Sarah in his arms.

"Yeah," she nodded. "Daddy, put me down, I think I can walk."

Joel looked at her incredulously. Her leg was broken. Wasn't it? "Are you sure, baby girl?" The words made Ellie flinch unwillingly.

"Yeah, my leg doesn't hurt anymore." Joel eased Sarah to the ground and she stood without issue.

"We gotta move," Tommy said, scanning the top of the hill. "Someone's bound to come investigate the gunfire."

"All right, lead the way," Joel instructed.

The four of them headed down the embankment until they reached the river. If the military was now gunning down civilians, it was best to stay unseen. Joel's mind fought to make sense of the situation. Two had made this journey before. Not four.

He held Sarah's hand tightly, leading her along. Tommy took the lead, wielding Joel's revolver, with Ellie a few steps behind, hunting rifle at the ready. From time to time, she would glance back at Joel and Sarah, a look on her face that was undecipherable to Joel. It was riding the chasm between joy and sadness.

"I like her," Sarah said quietly for only Joel to hear.

He smiled, eyes moving from Sarah to Ellie. "Yeah, I thought you might. Her savin' your life might've influenced your opinion."

"She's savin' your life, too," she said knowingly.

Joel gave it some thought, not realizing the scope of what Sarah was saying. "Yeah. I suppose you're right."

They walked on in silence, wary of their surroundings, listening for Infected or the military. All they could hear was the rustling of the adjacent river.

"You need her," she said matter-of-factly, "and she needs you."

Joel looked up at Ellie walking before them. Hearing those words come from his own daughter's mouth augmented their impact. Sarah was right.

"Besides... I've always wanted a sister."

"Sarah..." Joel said, sitting up in the bed. He looked around in confusion, trying to regain his bearings. He was back in the dark, disheveled hotel room in the Comfort Inn. Moonlight poured in through the window, bathing the room in a soft, cool glow. He looked down to his left, where Sarah had been a moment before, to find Ellie, stirring in her sleep at the absence of Joel's arm, which she had been using as a pillow.

"Wh-what's wrong?" she mumbled, half-asleep, eyes still closed.

Joel gazed down at her. "It's nothin'. Go on back to sleep, baby girl," he coaxed. _Baby girl._ Using those words had occasionally brought on pangs of guilt, but he always stifled them for Ellie's sake. But now there was nothing. He found himself running his thumb over the cracked face of the watch Sarah had given him so many years ago. His heart ached, longing for Sarah. He wasn't sure he would ever shake the feeling that he had failed her. He felt a creeping sorrow start to seep into his bones.

Something was tugging at his left arm. Looking down, he saw Ellie feebly pulling on his sleeve, eyes still closed. It took him a few seconds to realize that she was trying to get him to lay back down so she could use his arm as a pillow once again. He obliged, feeling the sorrow subside. _She's savin' your life, too._ Suddenly, Joel realized what Sarah had meant.

Any fears or guilt Joel felt about replacing Sarah vanished, and as he rubbed the watch, he realized that she would never be replaced. Ellie wasn't a replacement for his daughter; she was a second daughter. Their bond wasn't biological, but its strength betrayed that minor detail. She was the second chance he felt he didn't deserve, and he wasn't going to fail her. No matter what.

* * *

Spherical crystal drops hung suspended in the air, refracting sunlight into thousands of tiny rainbows cast over the receding snow. Winter's sharpened bite had left the air, and an optimistic warmth was driving the snow's retreat. With each passing day, the atmosphere became marginally warmer, and as the snow dissipated more and more it was mirrored by improvements in Ellie's mood.

They walked along the highway, guided by small patches of tarmac peeking through the ever-shrinking layers of snow. Ellie basked in the sunlight, soaking up every ounce of warmth she could. It had become just warm enough that she was considering shedding the winter coat.

Mercilessly, the featureless prairie had yielded to buttes and ridges, giving Ellie something to take her eyes off the remaining snow, which still symbolized a great deal of pain for her. Her eyes traced the seam where the ridges met the blue sky as they walked along.

Less snow meant less trudging, which meant their pace had improved considerably in comparison to the throes of winter. Ellie's mood wasn't the only one that had improved. Ever since the night of Joel's dream, details of which he hadn't shared with her, she had noticed that he hadn't been nearly as gruff as he typically was on the road. Sure, he always softened in the more intimate moments, but while they traveled he was more or less all business. Ever since the thaw had commenced, however, he seemed almost... chipper.

"Hey, Ellie..." he said, pulling her eyes away from the ridge.

"What?"

"Why couldn't the bicycle stand on its own?"

She couldn't believe her ears. Was this... Joel? Telling a joke? "I dunno, why?"

"Because it was two-tired."

She tried suppressing the laugh but failed miserably. Joel beamed, quite proud of himself. "Ahhhaha... Good one."

"Speakin' of too tired..." Joel started. "I'm really missin' our old friend Callus right about now..."

"Yeah, me too. He was a good horse," she replied. Ellie had grown quite fond of the trusty steed, and somewhere inside she hoped one of the cannibals she had killed was the one who had put a bullet through poor Callus.

"Awful name, though."

"Pffft," Ellie scoffed.

The ridges converged on the road, rising on both sides before them. Joel pulled out the tattered map of Wyoming to check their progress.

"All right. Looks like Rock Springs should be on the other side of this pass," he said, surveying the map. "Let's go, kiddo."

The closer they got to the pass, the more tense Joel became. His eyes constantly darted over the rock ledges on each side. He slowly came to a stop and held out an arm to stop Ellie. She hadn't been paying close attention and ended up running into his outstretched arm, looking up at him in surprise.

"What is it?"

Joel stood still, listening, eyes scouring the crags. Ellie could tell by his demeanor that something was wrong.

"Listen, get behind me and stay right on my heels. You don't leave my shadow, got it?"

Ellie, trusting him instantly, took her position. "Got it... but, what is it?"

"Perfect place for an ambush," he replied, pointing to various positions on the towering rock faces. "I'm not sure we're alone."

Ellie swallowed hard in his shadow. "Well. We both know that you know a thing or two about ambushes."

"Keep quiet," he hushed, pulling the revolver from its holster and silently instructing Ellie to do the same.

They moved forward with excruciating caution, Joel constantly scanning the ridges on each side. Every falling pebble or hint of sound made their hearts skip a beat. Ten steps. Fifteen steps. Twenty steps. The tension was palpable. If they weren't alone, Joel would have expected to hear something by now, but he wasn't about to let his guard down.

Suddenly, the silence was broken, and their veins filled with ice as they froze in place.

A voice from the ridge, "That's far enough."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 12**


	12. Chapter 12 - Rupture

**A/N: C'moooon who doesn't love a good cliffhanger? I know Ellie said she hates them, but inside, she loves them. We all do (as long as they're resolved.) So here's the resolution to the cliffhanger. Not much else to say about the chapter itself, just read it.**

**And for today's broken record announcement, I wanted to say thanks again to everyone who has read or reviewed this. I never thought I'd end up writing this much in this story but man... once you start it kind of just flows. Can't stop. Heck, this entry kept me up past midnight on a work night. But anyways, your kind words give me the encouragement to keep it up, so I extend my gratitude to you all. Enjoy the chapter!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 12**

**RUPTURE**

Joel's eyes frantically combed the ridges, but the source of the voice must have been well-hidden. He reached back to ensure that Ellie was tucked behind him. He tightened his grip on the revolver. Usually he was the shoot-first-talk-later type, but they were at a strategic disadvantage. Besides, whoever these people were, they could have easily taken Joel and Ellie out already, but they hadn't.

"Easy... not lookin' for trouble," Joel said tentatively. "Just hopin' to pass through, that's all."

"Hopin' to pass through…" another disembodied voice said. "Well, well, well… we can offer passage..."

"Th-" Joel started, before the voice cut him off.

"If you can pay the toll." The tone of the voice was bordering on sinister now.

Joel tensed as his grip tightened further. He knew the kind of toll that was most common in these scenarios. "What kinda toll?" he said, hoping he was wrong.

"Well, let's see what you have to offer," the first voice replied.

Movement on the ridge to the left caught Joel's attention, and a dusty wool cap came into view, accompanied by the barrel of a rifle not dissimilar to the one strapped to Joel's back. The man, like most people these days, was filthy, wearing a tattered old Carhartt jacket over a worn shirt that used to be blue.

Suddenly, there was a movement on the right side as well, as two men began making their way down the loose rock and gravel of the embankment.

"Stay behind me," Joel whispered back to Ellie.

As the three men approached, their features came into focus. The two of them from the right side had to be in their mid-twenties, while the man who had first appeared was probably pushing forty, and due to his seniority was probably the leader out of the three. They were all unkempt, and the familiar odor of men who hadn't showered in years wafted past Joel's nose while they were still some way off. The two younger men each had handguns. No way to tell if they were empty, which was quite common out in the middle of nowhere, but not something you'd want to gamble on. The men stopped about fifteen feet from where Joel and Ellie stood.

Joel quickly slung his pack off of his shoulders and attempted to disarm the situation, remaining standing as not to reveal Ellie, hoping against his instincts that they hadn't noticed her. "Well, let's see. W-" he almost said the word we, but quickly caught himself, hoping they wouldn't notice. "I don't have much. Roll of duct tape. Uhhh… let's see. Oh! There's this." He reluctantly pulled out the tin of the remaining coffee. "Still some grounds inside. Not great, but definitely drinkable. I'm sure it's been awhile since y'all had some coffee."

The leader's eyes widened a bit at the metallic tin. "Oh my…" Joel tossed the tin in his direction. "This is a pleasant surprise, indeed," the man said, catching the tin and prying back the lid to verify Joel's claims. "Might just be enough-"

"What else?" one of the younger men quickly cut off the leader.

"Uh…" Joel rummaged through the pack, praying to find another bartering chip. His hands found the phial of antiseptic. "Got a bit of antiseptic ointment."

The leader gestured for Joel to toss it his way and Joel complied, but the other two weren't satisfied.

"Say, whatcha hidin' back there?"

Joel's heart fell to the pit of his stomach.

"You holdin' out on us, old man? You been hidin' a treat back there, huh?" Ill-intent was heavy on the man's voice. Joel felt Ellie's free hand grasp the back of his jacket.

"Back off," Joel said as menacingly as possible.

The man stepped forward, brandishing the pistol. "I don't think you're in any kinda position to be givin' orders, motherfucker."

"Settle down, Randall," the leader beseeched.

"Shut the fuck up, Ed!" Randall spat before returning his gaze to Joel. "How 'bout this, old man. You let us have some fun with that tasty treat, we let you pass. Scout's honor."

Joel bristled with rage, but was paralyzed by the lack of options. Randall had his gun trained on the space between Joel's eyes. Any sudden movements and he'd be dead in an instant. Negotiation didn't seem to be working out too well. He sure as hell wasn't going to comply with their demand. If they wanted coffee, medicine, or guns, he was willing to part with them, but if they touched his little girl they would receive the full extent of his wrath.

Randall took another step in their direction. Suddenly, a pistol appeared in the right side of Joel's peripheral, and the subsequent gunshot made him flinch. One of Randall's eyes disappeared as the bullet burrowed through it and out the back of his skull. A second gunshot and the nameless younger man likewise slumped over, dead. Ed was apparently taken as off-guard as Joel was, and looked down at the two bodies in disbelief. The third gunshot tore a hole through his neck, and Ed fell to his back, sputtering and choking on his own blood. Joel snapped out of his state of shock and pointed the revolver at Ed's head, squeezing the trigger to end his misery.

Ellie stepped out from Joel's shadow and walked over to Ed's body. Joel was still trying to process what had just happened, and watched her, dumbfounded. She bent over and pried the tin of coffee and the antiseptic from his fingers. "Motherfucker," she muttered.

She returned to Joel and handed him the tin and phial, attempting to act nonchalant. He absently put them back into the pack, and caught a glimpse of Ellie's face as she turned away. An angry tear was sliding its way down her cheek.

"Ellie…"

"What?" she replied curtly, turning back to give him an indignant look, but the anger started to yield to the fear that it had suppressed. "You heard them, Joel. You heard what they were going to do…" her voice broke as her bottom lip started to tremble.

Joel hesitated, not quite knowing what to say. "I-I know… it's just… I'm… I'm sorry." It's all he could think to say.

"You don't have to worry about me," she responded automatically, instantly regretting the words. She tried her damndest to keep up the tough façade, but the cracks started to show as she let slip a whimper. She wiped a sniffle from her nose and tucked the pistol back into her waistband.

Joel's heart broke a bit at the words, and he turned to face her. "I worry," he said tenderly as he looked into her eyes. His laconic way with words struck Ellie again, and she began to sob involuntarily, trying but failing to keep from crying. Joel knelt down and took her into his arms as she let her legs give out. Her tears began to soak the weathered fabric as she wept into him, and he gently rocked her in an attempt to calm her down.

This merciless world had again put his poor little girl at the doorstep of sexual assault, rupturing wounds that had slowly begun to heal. Ellie had been doing remarkably well, considering the circumstances, but it was becoming increasingly evident to Joel that all of the demons that haunted her lived just beneath the surface. All it took was the right trigger to unleash them and they would ravage her mind again.

"It's okay… it's okay, baby girl… let it out…" he soothed softly, and she did.

They sat there, among the demons and the deceased, for what felt like hours.

* * *

It had been well over twenty years since Joel had held someone's hand like this, and he didn't realize how much he had missed it. At the age Sarah passed, it had been a few years since she felt comfortable holding her dad's hand in public. But here and now, walking into Rock Springs in the dying light, he held Ellie's hand tight, trying to provide her the strength and comfort she so desperately needed.

She walked beside him quietly, face downcast, mind engrossed in her thoughts. It had taken Joel the better part of an hour to help Ellie fight off the demons and get her to a state where they could move again. He had helped her up and set off to keep walking when he felt a small hand grasping at his. He didn't dare protest, even though this had been something he had only ever done with Sarah, but then remembered the dream and obliged, taking her hand.

The sun was careening toward the horizon, and Joel began seeking out places for them to settle in for the night. Before long they came across a Best Western with a name that caught Joel's eye.

"Outlaw Inn. That sounds like my kinda place. Whaddaya say, kiddo?" he asked, shaking Ellie's hand to pull her out of her mind.

She looked up at the sign and then over at the building. "Sure."

Joel frowned a bit at the reaction, but then realized he shouldn't expect her to be too enthusiastic about anything at the moment. Over the last couple hours of walking she seemed to have become distant, numb to everything around her. Joel wasn't sure how to remedy the situation, but knew he had to get them to shelter before night fell.

He leaned into the front door and pushed against the bench that was propped against the other side of it. Eventually it ceded and they squeezed past it. The accoutrements of the hotel weren't overly extravagant, but they had a simplistic and rustic western theme that Joel was rather fond of.

"All right, then. Let's go pick a room."

He led Ellie down the hall and searched the rooms until they found one that was relatively tidy with the windows still intact. Joel set their packs down and began going over the room to see if there was anything of value. Ellie would usually search along with him, but noticing her absence he turned to find her sitting silently on the side of the bed, green eyes boring into the dark carpet.

"Ellie?"

No response. He sighed, and decided to postpone the search. He sat down next to her on the bed and wrapped an arm around her shoulders. What words could he possibly say? Nothing he could come up with would make this all better, so he just let his presence be enough.

She remained silent for several minutes, finally muttering, "What choice did I have?"

Joel considered the rhetorical, and then offered, "The worst kind."

Ellie drew in a deep breath and exhaled. She leaned her head against Joel. After another several minutes, she said, "Thank you, Joel."

He turned to look down at her. "What for?"

"Keeping me together. I… I don't know what I would do if you weren't here."

"Well… you'll never have to find out. I promise."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 13**


	13. Chapter 13 - Cleanse

**A/N: Well, I think after this chapter we've got two more. This story, sad to say, is coming to a close. The two are nearing the Wyoming/Utah border, and from there it's a small jaunt to Salt Lake City. I'll do my best to bring this to a satisfying conclusion as it meets up with the beginning of spring from game. I've really, ****_really_**** enjoyed writing this, and I'm happy to see all of the people who have enjoyed reading it. I'm eager to begin Aftermath: Part II. Anyways, as always, please read, review, and enjoy!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 13**

**CLEANSE**

Four in the morning used to be Joel's favorite time of day. Early starts were a regular occasion working in construction, and getting in some hard labor before the heat of the day set in was common. He stood looking out the window and saw morning's light beginning to irradiate the eastern sky. It had been a while since he had been awake early enough to watch the sunrise. Weeks, maybe months. It was that first night after the encounter with David.

His eyes turned to Ellie, still fast asleep on the bed. Visions of that night flashed into his mind. Her crimson hands. Tear-stained, blood-spattered cheeks. Her whimpers of anguish. The _fear_ in her eyes. She had come such a long way since that night, but the damage it had wreaked was incontrovertible. She was markedly more withdrawn and quiet than before. Sure, she would perk up at certain things that were new to her, and she still had some amount of childlike wonder about the world, but her youthful spark was absent most of the time.

Joel's mind drifted to Sarah. She, too, had been forced to grow up faster than she should have. She learned to fend for herself fairly young, growing up without a mom, and a dad who couldn't be around nearly as much as he'd like. Joel considered raising her as a single father to be the greatest accomplishment in his life, greater than the piles of Infected he had taken out single-handedly. Killing was easy for him. Raising a teenager? That was a different story.

While Sarah had been forced to grow up quickly, it paled in comparison to the childhood Ellie must have had, if you could even call it a 'childhood.' She had told him brief details about the military preparatory schools she had been to. They were the kinds of places where the weak don't last long. You either grow up fast and learn the lengths you'll have to go to in order to survive this world, or you'll die young. And here she was, halfway across the country with the blood of dozens of men on her diminutive hands. They were all lives she was forced to take, and the act of taking them often saved Joel's skin, but he knew it weighed on her mind continually.

Ellie stirred in her sleep, reaching over to the empty side of the bed where Joel had been. Her brow furrowed at his absence as her hands passed back and forth over the worn sheet, and he quickly eased himself back into place next to her. Her distress vanished and her lips formed a faint smile as her hands met the fabric of his shirt. _She needs you_, the phantom of Sarah reminded him. Ellie unconsciously nuzzled up to his shoulder, leaving a hand on his chest. Joel had come to the point where he welcomed the contact rather than merely putting up with it. He couldn't believe it himself. Less than six months ago he couldn't wait to dump this little sprite with the Fireflies, and now he couldn't imagine being separated from her. He looked down at her and then turned back to the window, watching the sky transition from indigo to cobalt to cerulean. Ellie's light snoring must have been contagious, and before long he succumbed to the weight of his eyelids.

* * *

Pavement was glorious. Walking across pavement expends a fraction of the energy it takes to trudge through snow, and as the days grew longer the distance Joel and Ellie covered followed suit. The few remaining patches of snow spent the daylight hours retreating into themselves, and a soft spring breeze bore a gentle warmth that washed over the two travelers. Buds had started adorning the branches, and fresh green grass began emerging amongst the dead brown grass from the previous fall. Birds had begun their return migration from the warmer southern lands, and their calls lilted on the air. It was a gorgeous spring morning, and it almost made them forget about the state of the world, if only just for a moment.

After an hour or two they had reached the town of Green River and were walking along a road between the eponymous river itself and the sheer rock face of the adjacent butte. Joel surveyed the sparkling water that meandered over the land before them.

"Hey Ellie, I sure could go for some refreshment. C'mon," he beckoned as he began walking down the bank. She followed behind him tentatively.

Upon reaching the water's edge he crouched and scooped up some of the chilled water from the river. He splashed it on his face, feeling months of grime and sweat begin to loosen and wash away.

"What I'd give for a hot shower, but hey, this'll do in a pinch," he said, going for some more water.

Ellie sat down on the bank, watching him absently. Joel pulled up the flap of his button up shirt and inspected the puncture exit wound. The stitches had fallen out weeks ago, and the darkened scar tissue was mostly painless to the touch. He reached back to feel for the entrance wound. Same story there. Those scars would always remind him how Ellie had saved his life, perhaps both literally and figuratively.

"Quiet today," Joel said, turning around to look at her.

Ellie, too, had been examining her scars, running her fingertips over the white bumps surrounding the bite mark on her arm. She looked up, "Hmm?"

"I haven't heard you say more than two words since you woke up. Somethin' on your mind?" he asked.

Her eyes dropped to the water before them. She began to say something, but changed her mind after inhaling. She let the breath out, along with a bit of frustration.

Joel could tell there was something she wanted to say, but perhaps didn't know how to start. "Ellie… it's me you're talkin' to here."

"Agh. I know. It's just… sometimes when I say the words in my head it sounds so stupid."

Joel chuckled and stooped down to her eye level. "You don't have to worry about what it sounds like. I ain't gonna think any less of you." He gathered some water and poured it over his graying hair.

"I… I keep-" she was clearly having a hard time verbalizing what she wanted to say. "Th-… what happened back there… outside Rock Springs… and what happened… back at Lakeside…" she could barely finish the word. Joel saw pools forming at the bottom edge of her emerald eyes. She took a deep breath to steady herself. "I keep wondering what… what would have happened if you hadn't been there."

He stopped rinsing his hair and looked her. "Ellie. We've been over this. I'm not goin' anywhere. I was there then, I'm here now. Why dwell on somethin' like that?"

She looked away and stared at the water. She didn't answer him for some time, and he returned to his makeshift bathing. He splashed more water over his head when he heard her ask, "How is it… that you're never scared?"

He paused. "If I'm being completely honest with you, I'm scared all the time."

She looked at him skeptically. "You sure hide it well."

Joel shrugged. "Well… sometimes that right there is the difference between life and death. Truth is, these days, everyone is scared. All the time."

"What are you scared of?"

He stared into the depths of the river for a moment. "Loss."

She meditated on that word. She understood the weight that it held, and what it must mean to Joel. He had suffered loss the likes of which Ellie could only imagine. He had lost Tess. Ellie wasn't sure of the depth of their relationship, but when Tess had said "There's enough here that you have to feel some sort of obligation to me…" she knew they had to be more than just smuggling partners.

Her mind then drifted to the photograph she had tucked safely into the hidden pocket of her backpack. Sarah. Ellie had lost people too, but none of it compared to losing a daughter. She couldn't even comprehend it. She didn't even know how the whole thing happened.

"Joel?" she started before clearing the hesitation from her throat. "How… how did Sarah die?"

"Okay."

"Too much?"

"Mmm-hmm. Perhaps another time."

Ellie's eyes joined Joel's gazing out at the river, their minds stuck in the past. Joel shook free of it first.

"All right. Enough of this serious talk," he said before reaching down to splash some river water in Ellie's direction. She was blindsided by the unexpected shock of cold water in her face.

"Ah, what the fuck!?" she cried, wiping the water off of her face with her sleeve. "Oh, you're gonna pay for that one."

"Uh-huh," Joel replied smugly as he turned back to the river.

Without warning, he was ambushed by a fourteen-year-old jumping on his back. It was just about the last thing Joel expected, and he lost his footing. The two tumbled into the cold river. Fortunately, it was rather shallow in front of where Joel was standing.

Ellie splashed around, trying to get back to her feet and scamper out of the cold water. "Ahhhhhh! It's fucking freezing! I immediately regret this decision!" she yelped as she dragged herself up the bank.

"Didn't think that one through too well, did ya?" Joel asked as he shook the water from his face. She glared at him through violent shivering. "Well, let's lie out in the sun and dry off."

Ellie shed the red striped button up shirt as well as the thermal and laid them on a rock in the sun to dry, keeping on her black undershirt in equal parts modesty and hope that the color would help warm her in the sun. Joel had traded the soaked button up for a dry one from his pack, and hung the waterlogged shirt from a nearby tree.

They sat on the riverside together, absorbing the warm rays and gentle breeze. Ellie watched the birds flit from tree to tree, singing to each other, and smiled. Joel, still caught up a prior conversation, watched her closely.

"So… what are you most afraid of?" he asked.

She turned to look at him before looking back out at the river. She breathed a deep sigh, trying to decide whether or not to tell him. He had unknowingly assured her that her deepest fear wouldn't happen on his watch, but she was hesitant to fully buy into it. "Perhaps another time."

Joel raised an eyebrow, debating whether or not to pry. After seeing the look on Ellie's face, he decided against it and let it go. "Okay."

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONTINUES**

**WITH CHAPTER 14**


	14. Chapter 14 - Evanston

**A/N: Alright, this chapter got a little long, but I couldn't help it. Sometimes when I get on a roll, I just keep writing and don't realize how much I've written. Easy to do that writing these two. So here we are, second to last chapter of the story. I promise to bring everything to a fitting conclusion with chapter 15, and I plan to end it right at the exact moment Spring starts in the game. Should be a good one! Thank you all for making it this far in this story. It's become more than I ever expected when I wrote chapter one, and your kindness and compliments have kept me coming back, as I hope my writing has kept you coming back. Anyway, as always, read, review, and most of all enjoy the chapter!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 14**

**EVANSTON**

Everything was green. As far as the eye could see, green, in every direction. Spring was in full bloom. Foliage was bursting forth from the cracks in the long forgotten highway. Leaf-covered vines were scaling crumbling walls, re-staking their claim to territory that was once theirs long ago. The warm, golden blanket of late afternoon sunshine draped itself over the town of Evanston.

Joel lifted an arm to shield his eyes from the sun. With only a couple hours until dark, it was best to look for shelter in the city. The Wyoming-Utah border would still be waiting for them tomorrow. He surveyed the city from the overpass. It looked like a decent-sized town, with plenty of homes, fast food restaurants, and convenience stores that might hold some valuable loot.

"Ellie, let's head on down into town, see what we can find. We'll stay the night here," Joel said as he began down the embankment.

"Right behind you," Ellie called after him.

A large, unassuming building greeted them as they began into town, the letters FAMILY DOLLA adorning the space over the front door. The discarded letter R lay in pieces on the concrete below the sign.

Joel gestured toward the building. "Might be worth takin' a look in here. Don't expect anything too extravagant though."

"Why not?" Ellie inquired.

"This here's a 'dollar store.' Ever heard of one of those?"

Ellie shook her head. "Nuh-uh. But… let me guess. Everything inside costs a dollar?"

"Near enough," Joel replied, bending down to pick up a metal pipe that had been abandoned in the parking lot. "Let's go check it out."

Joel cautiously approached the glass façade of the building. The doors had been chained shut from the inside, but someone had taken the liberty of breaking a window to gain entry. Sparkling fragments of glass littered the pavement. Joel crouched under a support beam and into the building, boots crunching on the broken glass.

"Alright, c'mon," he whispered back to Ellie.

She followed his footsteps into the dollar store. The aisles were dimly lit with the fading daylight, and merchandise was strewn about everywhere. Most of the goods in the store were of no use in a survivor's world and had been cast to the floor in favor of the little that could be found useful. Joel rummaged through the shelves looking for anything worth taking, eventually coming across another roll of tape and a pair of scissors. As he placed them in his pack, there was a shuffling sound followed by a dull thud near the back of the store. Joel and Ellie crouched in unison.

"Sounds like runners," she whispered.

Joel strained his ears and heard the wheezing and agonizing moans coming from the back of the store. He chanced a look over the nearest shelf and saw at least four figures, some keeled over, others aimlessly shuffling about in the back aisles.

_Damn Infected_, Joel thought to himself. He had always loathed the Infected for everything they had cost him, but that hatred intensified after he became attached to Ellie. Every time they encountered Infected, it meant putting Ellie at risk, something Joel was becoming less and less comfortable with as time pressed on. Sure, she had proven more than capable, but his paternal instinct was pushing that knowledge aside in a desire to keep her safe at all costs.

Rather than risk a confrontation with the runners, Joel motioned to Ellie to return the way they came. He quickly ushered her through the broken window. As he crouched to exit behind her, his boot nudged an old postcard display. He turned back to see the display totter and then, as if in slow motion, come crashing to the ground.

"God dammit. Ellie, get ready!" he warned her.

Sure enough, the commotion had alerted the Infected within the dollar store, and they came running to inspect the source of the sound. Joel pulled the pipe out in preparation for the ensuing scuffle. The runners, still holding onto their sense of sight, noticed the uninfected humans standing at the ready in front of the dollar store. Their shrieks pierced the silence over Evanston, and they began crashing through the windows of the store.

"How many bullets you have left?" Joel asked as Ellie readied her pistol.

"Three."

"Make 'em count," he advised as he tightened his grip on the pipe, advancing to meet the first runner who had broken through. It was grotesque. Tendrils of fungus had begun forcing their way under its skin, producing boils around its misaligned eyes. Trails of blood seeped from every orifice, and white moldy growths had begun appearing in various places on its skin. Joel guessed that these had probably turned a few weeks ago.

He gathered momentum and coiled to swing the pipe, unleashing a mighty blow on the lead runner. Its skull burst like a piece of rotten fruit, showering its contents over the parking lot. The body fell limp to the pavement. The next runner had emerged from the store and was charging Joel, who was still recovering his balance from the swing. A well-placed bullet felled the creature a foot or two before it reached him._ Bless you, baby girl_, he thought to himself once again. The third runner clambered through the opening in the storefront and began stumbling toward Ellie. Joel headed it off and sent it to the pavement with a strong swing of the pipe, proceeding to stomp its head in for good measure.

A fourth runner was limping its way towards them, gnashing its teeth and shrieking what almost sounded like the words "NO! I CAN'T!" Joel cringed as he drove the pipe into its brain, putting the creature out of its misery. Maybe the people were still in there somewhere, powerless to stop what the fungus was forcing them to do.

The sound of shuffling feet came from within the dollar store, accompanied by the telltale clicking noise. Joel sighed in exasperation. The clicker stumbled out of the storefront, tripping over the windowsill. It rose to its feet and began its echolocation routine, throwing clicks and screeches over the parking lot.

"Ellie, now would be the time to use those last two bullets," Joel murmured to her as he knelt to fish through his pack.

"Right," she replied, steadying the pistol on the clicker's head. She fired the first shot, and the bullet buried into the fungal plates blossoming out of the clicker's face. It stumbled back from the impact, but quickly regained its balance and belted out rage-filled clicks, frantically waving its arms as it advanced towards Ellie. Joel grabbed the scissors and a roll of duct tape and began to fasten the scissors to the end of the pipe, securing it as best he could. Ellie fired another shot, but again the bullet embedded itself into the fungal armor covering the clicker's head. "I'm out!" she cried.

Joel rose to his feet, brandishing the improvised weapon, and advanced on the clicker. Sound waves ricocheted off of him and back to the clicker's ears, causing it to turn his direction. Joel wound up and swung the scissor-tipped pipe into the side of the clicker's head. The blade pierced the armor and buried itself in its brain. The clicker fell to the ground, convulsing in pain. Joel dislodged the weapon from its head and brought it back down with a sickening thud, rendering it silent and still.

He released his grip on the pipe and dropped to his backside to catch his breath. "That was-"

"Too damn close," Ellie finished for him, joining him on the pavement.

"You all right?" he asked.

She exhaled. "Yeah… you?"

"I'm good."

He stood and went to examine the bodies, looking for clues or anything they could loot. Whoever these people were, they must have passed through Evanston a few weeks ago. Three of the four of them had backpacks on. They were probably travelers on the same road. Then he noticed the band on their arms, with the iconic symmetrically-opposed letter Fs.

"Fireflies."

The word caught Ellie's attention, and she sauntered over to see what Joel was talking about. "They're Fireflies?"

"Were. Must have been passin' through, maybe on the way to Salt Lake City themselves." He looked over at the clicker, and found no sign of an arm band. "Probably ran into this clicker, caught off-guard." He looked over the runners again. "They got bites. There, and there." He pointed to the visible bite marks on each of the runners.

Ellie was visibly discouraged. "Joel… what happens if we get there… to Salt Lake City… and there are no Fireflies?"

Joel sighed, but didn't have the right answer to the question. "I reckon we'll cross that bridge if we come to it," is all he could offer. He knew what his answer would be, if that scenario ever came into being: he'd take them back to Jackson, back to Tommy's town, and see if they couldn't lead a somewhat normal life. If he was being honest with himself, he was tempted more and more with each passing day to say 'screw it' and turn north, heading for Jackson. He had come close to suggesting it to Ellie numerous times, but had always changed his mind at the last moment. He knew how important this mission was to her. To Ellie, it meant redemption, and he didn't want to rob her of that.

They started to rummage through the backpacks of the deceased Fireflies, taking anything of value. After gathering what they could, they proceeded further into Evanston. The faded, once-golden arches towering over a nearby fast food restaurant caught Ellie's eye.

"Hey, there's one of those McDonald's restaurants again. Might be some food inside," she suggested.

The mere mention of food made Joel's stomach rumble. It had been a couple days since they last ate. "All right, here's hopin'... I'm famished."

The building was being reclaimed by a tree that had burst through the sidewalk, dismantling one of the corners of the foundation and pushing its way through the brick and glass. The door was locked, but the tree had provided an opening where it grew through one of the windows. Joel vaulted his way inside, reaching back to help Ellie into the restaurant. The floor was covered with dry leaves that had blown in the previous fall. Joel headed to the kitchen and Ellie followed close behind. He looked back to find her rubbing her left side near her ribs.

"How's that rib feelin'?"

"I think it's just about fully healed. Doesn't hurt much anymore," she answered.

"Yeah, broken ribs can linger for a while. Glad it's feelin' better," he said as he leapt over the counter.

There wasn't much to see in the kitchen. It looked like it had been thoroughly scoured, and anything that remained was perishable and thus unrecognizable as food. It probably wasn't worth checking the walk-in freezer, but Joel figured it couldn't hurt. Prying open the door, he was hit with a strong whiff of mold. He instinctually covered his mouth with his sleeve, fearing it might be cordyceps spores, but upon peering into the walk-in, he realized it was just a run-of-the-mill type of fungus instead. Boxes on the shelves were christened with white accents as the mold consumed them and their contents. A decomposed body slouched in the corner, bones picked clean by fungus and a myriad of other decomposers. Ellie took a step into the walk-in and was immediately chased out by the stench.

"All right, nothin' here. Let's get a move on," Joel said.

A couple blocks down the road they were pleased to find an abandoned Jubilee, which Joel explained to Ellie used to be a grocery store. Hoping to find some edible canned goods, they headed inside. Everywhere in the store were signs of the madness that ensued after the outbreak. Empty shelves, broken glass, toppled displays. Everything was in disarray.

"Man... this place is a shithole," Ellie observed.

"Yeah. Well, when everything went down, people stopped carin' about each other and only cared about themselves and their loved ones. A lot of lootin' went down, and people were pretty reckless about it. Stores like this that had plenty of food got hit first. After a while, neighborhoods got hit, like the one we were in in Pittsburgh," Joel informed while fruitlessly scanning the shelves.

"Geez," she replied, kicking aside a discarded box of long-expired cereal.

Joel shrugged. "Like I said, you really got to see people's true selves after the outbreak. Got to see what they were really capable of."

They turned down an aisle that used to hold canned goods. Naturally, the pickings were slim, but a few cans did remain among the disorder.

Ellie picked one up eagerly and read the scuffed label. "Canned beets." Picking up another, "Pickled mushrooms... hell if I eat anything fungus-related."

Joel came across a flat tin, label torn off, but reckoned from the shape it contained sardines. "They never leave anything the slightest bit appetizin', do they?" he muttered to no one in particular.

"Guess not," Ellie replied, to Joel's surprise. She had better ears than he thought. She picked up another unlabeled can and slipped it into her pack, then turned to follow Joel out of the store.

* * *

There were quite a few older houses in Evanston that Ellie might have referred to as quaint. She was quite taken with one of them near the middle of a quiet street and had insisted they stay there for the night.

Joel was trying to figure out how to put together an appetizing meal with canned beets, pickled mushrooms, and sardines, but quickly realized that not even Henry could have pulled off that feat. Once again, edible would have to suffice.

Ellie rubbed her palms over the cool metal of the unmarked can she had found. She was mildly excited to find out what surprise it held within, especially considering the pungent odor coming from the cans Joel was opening with the scavenged can opener they had found.

"Toss that here," she ordered, motioning to the can opener, and he complied.

She punctured the can, and a dark liquid began seeping out. It wasn't what she was expecting, and she looked at it quizzically. She brought the can to her nose and took a tentative sniff. It had a rich, fairly pleasing scent. She put her finger to the thick substance and hesitantly placed a dab of it on her tongue. Flavor burst forth and her taste buds rejoiced at the sweetness.

"Holy moley! Joel, what is this!?" she sprung over to him, pushing the can into his face.

"Slow down there, kiddo. Let's see," he said, taking a dab on his own finger and placing it in his mouth. A deep, sonorous laugh escaped through his nose as he savored the nostalgic taste. "That right there… that's Hershey's syrup."

"Hershey's… like… chocolate?"

"Yes indeed."

"Chocolate comes in liquid form?!" she asked, grabbing the can back from him to indulge herself again.

"It used to. For all we know, this is the last can of Hershey's syrup in existence. Back in my day, it was hard to find it in a can at all. They came in small plastic jugs, most often."

She scattered words between pauses to take a taste of the syrup. "I think… this might be… the best thing… I've ever tasted."

"Better than bourbon?"

She looked at him wryly, but then paused to consider. After all, she _had_ grown quite fond of bourbon. "I think this takes the cake. Whatever cake is…"

Joel shook his head to himself and muttered, "Poor thing." He watched her ravenously lick up the syrup. "You better pace yourself, kiddo. You're gonna make yourself sick. We hit Utah tomorrow, and I ain't carryin' you across the border."

She reluctantly put the can down. "Fine. I'll save some for later. I'm gonna need to wash down that 'food' you got over there."

"Me too," Joel replied, looking at the fetid cans in disgust.

They barely managed to choke down a meal before retiring with the comforting taste of chocolate syrup lingering on their lips. Tomorrow, they'd hit Utah. Soon after, Salt Lake City. There they would fulfill their mission, save mankind, and return to Jackson to live out their lives... or so they thought.

* * *

**AFTERMATH CONCLUDES**

**WITH CHAPTER 15**


	15. Chapter 15 - Weight

**A/N: Well. Here we are: the final chapter in Aftermath: Part I. This has been an incredibly enjoyable experience for me, and I'm thankful for this phenomenal game that got me writing again for the first time since high school. I wanted to extend a thank you to anyone who has ever read even a chapter of this story or offered their kind words to me. You guys sure know how to make someone feel good about themselves. As it happens, today is my birthday, so here is my gift to you all, the final chapter in the story that has become the piece of literature I'm most proud of writing. Please enjoy it! Once again, thank you, seriously! I'll be starting Aftermath: Part II in the coming days, so be on the lookout for that! I'm extremely eager to get started on it, got a lot of good ideas!**

**DISCLAIMER/LEGAL MUMBO-JUMBO: I do not own The Last of Us, it is Naughty Dog's property.**

* * *

**CHAPTER 15**

**WEIGHT**

A deep ache in the pit of her stomach pulled Ellie out of a rare instance of dreamless sleep. Slowly, she sat up on the old, dusty couch and rubbed her midsection. As it turned out, following up a meal of brined and pickled foods with an overdose of chocolate syrup doesn't bode well for your stomach. Her insides churned within her and she felt she was on the verge of throwing up. She swung her legs off the edge of the couch and steadied herself, not eager to lose her dinner all over her sleeping quarters. She looked over at Joel, lying on his side on the hardwood floor. A long snore indicated that he was still out, and she didn't want to wake him over something as minor as an upset stomach, so she picked up her backpack, quietly crept her way to the front door and slipped out onto the porch.

The sky was still dark, but a hint of light was beginning to arise from the direction they had entered the city. Evanston was still and silent in the predawn hours, like nearly every other town they had been through. She hadn't been in anything remotely resembling a bustling city since Boston's QZ, and she didn't miss it. The tranquility was comforting, the peace only being broken by the occasional call of an early-risen bird.

Ellie took a seat on the rickety deck chair and pulled her knees up to her chest, waiting for the upset stomach to subside. She looked up and down the street, trying to imagine this place before the outbreak using snippets of what Joel had told her: white picket fences, people rising early, drinking the bitter concoction known as coffee, cooking breakfast and greeting the day before heading to work. A paperboy riding a bicycle down the street, tossing newspapers onto doorsteps. It all seemed so... unbelievable. So carefree. She couldn't fathom rising in the morning without having to worry about Infected having stumbled across her position, or walking outside without being anxious about being gunned down and robbed, or worse, by a pack of hunters. She couldn't even imagine having fully-stocked cupboards, a refrigerator to preserve your food and have cold drinks at your fingertips, and a freezer, filled with ice cream in her imagination. How she longed for just a small taste of the stuff.

Could that all be attainable again someday? If mankind got the vaccine, could life ever be that sort of normal again? Ellie looked down and realized she was absently tracing the scar on her right forearm. What made her so special? Why did she get to live when Riley suffered such a horrible end? She looked to the western sky, still veiled in darkness. Somewhere over that horizon was Salt Lake City and, within it, the Fireflies. She hoped. She fished through her pack and found the treasured Firefly pendant she had kept close ever since that fateful night, and rubbed her thumb over the stamped letters. RILEY ABEL.

"I miss you," Ellie whispered, wishing that somehow her friend could hear her.

She replaced the pendant, and in the process her fingers brushed against the smooth, colorful plastic of the toy robot. Sam. She felt an ache of sadness and guilt engulf her. That last conversation ran through her mind once again. Sam knew he was going to either lose himself or die, and she had provided no comfort. Probably the opposite, actually. Sure, she couldn't have known what was going on, but that fact didn't make her feel any better about it. What if he was still lucid when he attacked her? What if he had to watch himself trying to tear apart his own friend, powerless to stop it? A shiver coursed through Ellie's body and she futilely tried to clear the thoughts out of her mind, wiping away a fugitive tear that was fleeing down her cheek.

She drew a deep breath and tried to exhale evenly, pushing the emotions down. She crossed her arms over her knees and rested her chin upon them. Turning her eyes upward, she gazed at the slowly fading plethora of stars, more numerous in a world devoid of light pollution. She felt so small, so insignificant, in light of the universe. And yet, she was supposed to be the cure for mankind. _Do you even realize what your life means?_ Joel's words echoed through her mind. That conversation was one she didn't enjoy reminiscing about, and she shook it away. She hadn't asked for any of this, and this burden was proving too heavy for her young shoulders. She had been too strong for too long, and the cracks were starting to show.

Her thoughts turned to her snoring companion. Thinking about Joel had always pulled her out of funks like this. They had been through so much together, and the bond they had formed was like none she had ever experienced. Most relationships she had been a part of were short-lived or distant. Her friendships with Riley and Sam were cut tragically short. She had had a bit of a connection with Tess, but that relationship didn't even last a day. She had told Joel that Marlene was a friend, but she honestly barely knew her. She had been with Joel for nearly a year, and and the depth of their relationship had only grown. He had seen her at her most vulnerable and didn't abandon her. On the contrary, that's when he had drawn closest. That day at the university when he was impaled was the most terrified she had ever been in her life, including the day she was bitten. She would have died along with him if he hadn't-

"Mornin', kiddo."

Ellie jumped. She had been so consumed in thought that she hadn't heard him join her on the porch. "Oh shit, you scared me."

He smirked proudly. "I'm sneaky when I wanna be. Whatcha doin' out here at this hour?"

"I couldn't sleep. Upse-" she paused, not wanting to admit that Joel had been right about pacing herself with the chocolate syrup. She cleared her throat, "Bad dream."

Joel's demeanor shifted to concern. "Go on, tell me about it."

Ellie looked up at him and, seeing his genuine solicitude, felt a bit guilty. "I dreamt that I ate too much chocolate syrup and got a stomach ache… and then I woke up and realized it wasn't a dream," she said bashfully.

Joel gave her a look and then chuckled as he took a seat next to her. "Told you so."

They sat together quietly, marveling as the sun peered over the horizon, bathing the porch in a warm glow.

* * *

"Welcome to Utah," Ellie heard Joel read off the sign at the side of I-80. She looked up at the sign, seeing the depiction of a skier plunging through deep powder below the words Joel had read. "Home stretch, Ellie. Few more days of walkin' and we'll be there." She nodded in response.

The sun was high overhead, but it was a relatively cool day. Ellie had buttoned the red striped shirt over the thermal to keep herself warm. So far, Utah was undecipherable from Wyoming, but Joel had assured her they would have to climb mountains before reaching Salt Lake City. He told her that it was the biggest range in the US, and she was actually quite eager to see mountains of that size. The ascension would be exhausting, but it was the shortest route to the city.

Joel was in a rather good mood today, or so Ellie thought. He was basking in the sun and would even hum from time to time as they walked. That morning's ruminations were still weighing heavy on Ellie's mind, and she found it difficult to replicate his cheery attitude. She hadn't realized that she was lagging a few steps behind.

"Hey, c'mon kiddo, keep up," Joel instructed.

Ellie snapped out of it and trotted up to his side. "Sorry."

Joel studied her countenance. "Somethin' on your mind today?"

"You could say that."

"Well… what is it?"

Ellie paused and considered. "Eh... I don't really feel like talking about it."

"You sure?" Joel asked, his concern not going unnoticed by Ellie.

She scrunched her face as she thought about it. "Yeah. It's nothing, I'm fine."

Joel paused. "Ellie, I know you well enough to tell when you're lying."

"I just- I don't want to talk about it, okay?" a hint of irritation snuck out with the words.

Joel backed off, figuring he had pushed a bit too far. "Okay. That's fine. I ain't tryin' to... interrogate you or anything. Just a bit worried, is all."

Ellie felt a bit of remorse for snapping at him. "I know, I know," she sighed. "I'm sorry. Thanks for caring, really. It's just... it's my problem to deal with. I don't want to put that burden on you."

Joel stopped walking and grabbed her by the shoulder, turning her to face him. "Ellie, don't ever let the feeling that you might be a burden stop you from confidin' in me, okay?"

"Okay," she replied meekly.

"We've been through... well, through hell together. Please don't keep somethin' to yourself if I could help you deal with it."

"I don't think you can in this case. It's... ugh... it's just something I have to deal with, okay?"

Joel's eyes scoured hers, and after some time, he replied, "Okay."

* * *

The outskirts of Salt Lake City emerged on the far side of the mountains. Their goal was finally in sight. Nearly a year on the hardest road and Ellie's chance for redemption finally met her eyes.

"Well, look at that," Joel said, looking over the city. "Salt Lake City. We made it, kiddo."

"Yeah," Ellie replied, a hint of a smile crossing her face.

They continued walking into the city. Her mind wandered back to everything that had brought them to this point. Boston, Lincoln, Pittsburgh, Jackson, Fort Collins... her mind trailed off, not wanting to dwell on the winter experience again. She could hardly believe they had done it. That afternoon when she had met Joel felt like years ago. She never expected to grow so close to someone she had such a negative first impression of. She looked up at him and smiled to herself.

Now that their mission was coming to a close, fear started creeping in. She didn't know what would happen after she saw the doctors. Would Joel stick around? Would he head back to Boston, and if so, would he bring her along?

She looked to him for reassurance. "Joel... When we're done... what happens then?"

"I reckon we'll cross that bridge when we come to it," he replied. She wasn't satisfied with his answer, but something on the edge of the highway caught her eye. It was an engraving on the wall. She ambled over to it.

She felt ice creeping into her veins. It was an engraving of a deer, adorned with antlers. It was the symbol of the onset of the most traumatizing period in her life. The very symbol of despair. The warmth of the spring breeze gave way to a biting winter wind. Salt Lake City disappeared, and suddenly she was hundreds of miles away, deep in a thick forest. Snow-laden trees materialized to surround her. Snow had gathered around her ankles. Flakes settled onto her red ponytail. She was rooted in place as her mind plunged her back into that frozen hell. The stag turned its head to face her.

She had been doing everything she could to erase these memories, but in an instant, they had sprung to the surface. She felt everything. Joel was nowhere to be seen, and loneliness consumed her. The stag was lying on the ground, lifeless, an arrow protruding from its shoulder. David appeared from behind a tree. The feeling of dread manifested in the pit of her stomach. She was standing in the cage, with her hands on the bars. David placed his hand on hers. She shuddered. Everything went white, as she stood in the blizzard, eyes darting around, aimlessly seeking a way out. She couldn't shut her eyes, as they fixed on the engraving. Smoke stung her lungs as she scampered through the burning restaurant, fleeing from the vindictive taunts of her pursuer. Suddenly, there was a weight on her chest, and she felt pinned. She felt the coarse plastic of the machete handle on her palm.

A distant voice was calling her name, but she didn't hear it. She was alone.

* * *

**THE END**

**THIS CONCLUDES AFTERMATH: PART I  
STAY TUNED FOR THE FIRST CHAPTER OF PART II**


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